


Hope is a Waking Dream

by immoral_crow, johanirae



Series: Hope is a Waking Dream [1]
Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Inception (2010), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Clint's family, Dreamsharing, Eames as a cameo part, F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-13
Updated: 2015-11-13
Packaged: 2018-05-01 10:32:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5202569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/immoral_crow/pseuds/immoral_crow, https://archiveofourown.org/users/johanirae/pseuds/johanirae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint is struggling in the wake of the Battle of New York, and Natasha is concerned. He needs something to tie him to this world, to give him a reason to make it through each fight... but what can she do? She can hardly make him a family out of thin air and a handful of dreams. Or can she? </p>
<p>In a world where dreamsharing technology is available if you have the money or connections, who would be better to stage an inception than S.H.I.E.L.D? But at what cost? Especially when Hydra is revealed and S.H.I.E.L.D's information is made public. </p>
<p>How will Clint react when he finds out his family isn't real? And how will he hold onto his humanity when his body is spun from plastic and his family is woven from dreams?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hope is a Waking Dream

New York is not something that Clint ever thinks he’ll recover from. 

He doesn’t make a big deal of it, just gets on with his life as best he can. He’s caused enough mayhem already without taking up more of everyone’s time by indulging in self pity. 

It sticks in his throat though. Every time he lines up next to the other Avengers; every time they fight together; every time he’s hailed as a _hero_ it rips the wound open a little wider until he’s not sure how much of him is left around the edges of the gaping hole that is his conscience. 

“You’re gonna be alright,” Natasha tells him too often, and Clint’s not sure which of them she’s trying to convince at this point. 

She’d be his biggest concern, except Fury seems to have her on wildcard duty, and she’s splitting most of her time between Banner and Rogers. He’s not sure what her remit’s meant to be with them, and he’s damned if he’s going to pry too deeply. Right now it’s a struggle to make it day to day even without buying himself trouble in the shape of Fury’s convoluted plans. 

So he keeps his head down, does his best to do his best; tries and fails to believe that it can, in any way, make up for the worst he’s done. 

Suicide, he thinks, would be a coward’s way out. Too many people have died to get him to here – Phil included – and no matter how much Clint hates that they are dead, he can’t bring himself to make their lives a waste. It’s woefully inadequate, but the only way he has to honor them is to keep on living. In any case, it’s an academic point. He’s only a human and he’s fighting on a team of superpower-ed heroes – proper heroes, not the sort of sham second class of hero that Carson would trot out to perform feats of derring-do for an audience of slack jawed yokels. That’s all Clint ever was, after all. Right now he’s fairly sure it’s all he ever can or will be. 

There’s no space for him, not really, on a team like this. They fight super villains. It’s not rocket science and you don’t need to be Stark-clever to work it out: it really is just a matter of time. 

Until then, Clint is going to do what he can so that the others didn’t die in vain. That and try to make sure that when he is finally taken out that there is as little collateral damage as possible. 

It’s a balancing act. Stark and Rogers have both decided that the team needs to be, well… a team. To hold himself aloof from that process would be tantamount to declaring he doesn't intend to be a part of that team, and Natasha is busy, not stupid, and has her own reasons for wanting to keep him around. 

So, he goes to the pizza nights, takes part in the drinking games, but at the end of the night he goes home to his own apartment, as far from the bright lights and bustle of Stark Tower as he can find. He checks on his neighbors, he feeds his dog; he pretends to be a regular Joe doing regular Joe stuff and worrying about regular Joe things. 

Sometimes, after the second bottle of beer, he wonders what his life would be like if he really was living the lie he portrays. Better, he decides, after the third bottle. There wouldn’t be any nightmares where everything is blue and simple, he admits to himself after the fifth, sixth, seventh. 

And in the end, when it finally does fall apart, it does so in the most innocuous way. 

“Thanksgiving,” Natasha says, fixing him with a look. “What are your plans?”

“Dunno,” he says, and it’s perhaps the most truthful thing he’s said in weeks. “Not really thought about it.” 

It’s only as her brows snap down that he realizes his mistake. “Phil’s gone,” he tries, too little, too late. “It wouldn’t be the same without him.”

She hums agreement and wanders off, and that’s when he knows he’s in trouble. If she’d shouted, reminded him that it wasn’t Phil who always wanted to make a fuss of the holidays, it was Clint, then it would have all been okay. But she doesn’t, and in her silence Clint hears the understanding and condemnation of his plan, and knows that things are going to change now. 

—

Natasha, by her own assessment, is not someone who is worried easily. 

It takes something special, something unusual. Something like holiday-freak Barton not making plans for Thanksgiving. 

And once she’s noticed that one thing it seems she cannot stop seeing. 

He doesn’t live with them. She’d known that of course – intellectually at least. What she hasn’t seen until now was how little time he spends here; spends as part of the team. 

All in all, she decides, he’s not doing a bad job of it, of pretending to be functioning. But it doesn’t hold up to scrutiny, and she doesn’t know what that means. Either things are much worse than she’s suspected and he _can’t_ – or things are much worse than she suspected and he wants help. 

Either option is undesirable. 

Self knowledge is a hard won thing, and Natasha has paid in coins, sweat and blood and tears. She knows she doesn’t understand people – not in any good way. Not in any way that would fix them. 

She could manipulate Clint, she thinks. Leave him feeling better about himself and his place in the world, but it wouldn’t be a _true_ thing, and Clint is worth more than smoke and mirrors. Stripped of S.H.I.E.L.D, stripped of a team who knew Clint as he was, her options here are limited, and for the first time in weeks she wishes she had Phil to talk to. 

He’s gone though, and no amount of wishful thinking will bring back the dead. Fury would be a good second choice, but he’s dropped off the radar, probably alive but really, who knows these days. After that, she’s out of options, which is possibly why she starts trying to look for Barton’s brother. 

It’s a last ditch attempt, and she’s not sure what will happen, but in the end even she is surprised. 

There are safeguards in place for the people they care about. Of course there are – none of them were ever under any illusions about the dangers of their jobs, and the dangers they face themselves are nothing compared to the fear that those they love will become collateral damage. Relationship status is secondary to that fear: Pepper is protected, of course, and Betty, Jane, Rhodey. Phil’s family had been protected – are still protected because old loyalties die hard and slow in this job; even Natasha has a name or two on the list, no matter how hard it would be to find out who they are. And Barton has Barney. 

Natasha’s always wondered about this. He’s been married after all, had more lovers than she has. She even asked once, way back when, while they were trapped in a safe house and she had doubted that S.H.I.E.L.D would bother sending in an extraction team. 

“No need for them.” Clint’s smile was lazy and devastating, and if Natasha had been a different woman, or had a different history, it would have been dangerous. “The people I fall for can look after themselves.” His eyes met hers, and for a second the breath caught in her throat. “It’s part of the attraction.”

She wonders, sometimes, what would have happened if she’d said anything then; if she’d made him tell her what he meant… but she hadn’t, and the moment had passed. The extraction team arrived less than an hour later, Coulson at its helm, and she’d seen the way he and Clint had looked at each other and decided it was best to forget what she’d thought she’d heard. 

The fact remains, though, that the only person Clint had ever thought worth protecting was his brother. Payback, maybe, for their childhood. Fear of losing the last ties to the real world, to his family possibly. But whatever the reason it gives Natasha a place to start, a lead she can build on if she wants to save her friend. 

The first lead brings her to a prison. It is, as she suspects, a dead end, and she’s not at all surprised when the things she unearths lead her to the FBI. 

Getting beyond that is a struggle, and if she didn’t know better she would think that someone else is involved in hiding Barney Barton. She does know better, though, and she recognizes Phil’s touch, and it makes her miss him more. There’s no one now who’ll bother to keep an eye on them like this; who’ll bury the people they love behind red-tape and firewalls until they become the sort of ghosts who can’t attract attention. Soon enough the protection will fade, and they’ll be on their own. It makes her feel horribly tired to realize this, to realize her own vulnerable humanity. 

—

“What’s up, Red?” Stark asks her as she stalks home after another night of picking her way through the last defenses that keep them safe.

She shrugs – the choice is say nothing or say too much – but something must show in her face because by the time she gets to her room there’s a tray of tea, Russian, hot, and perfect, waiting for her. She sips it slowly, savoring the warmth, and as she drinks, as the familiar taste calms and centers her, she starts to think that maybe she’s not as alone as she feared.

The trick now will be extending that protection to Clint. 

She’s not sure why, but she’s still positive that Barney is the key to this. If anyone can break through whatever Clint’s feeling right now, it’s his brother – or at least she hopes it is. It motivates her, _keeps_ her motivated when the paths to Barney become tortuously convoluted. 

It takes a while, not least because life as an Avenger is hardly peaceful, and her’s least of all. How can she prioritize one team mate over another? They, each of them, are carrying their own pain and there’s little enough she can do to help them, but she finds, maybe for the first time, she actually wants to help. 

Still, Clint was there first, took her side when he had little cause to do so, and gave her the chance to have another life, one that makes a difference, that is worth saving. Which is how she finds herself in the countryside about 20 miles outside Ithaca on a cool Thursday evening in early October. She’s parked about a half mile from Barney’s house, which is a risk, but she thinks her chances of finding him home are improved if he doesn’t hear a strange car arriving. 

Besides, it’s a pleasant evening to go visiting and the walk will give her time to catch up with herself, to work out what she’s going to say. 

She’s expecting a lot of things: she’s hoping that it will work, that Barney will come back to the city with her, that he’ll manage to get Clint to talk to him, that having a family again will give Clint something to motivate him, something to make his eyes light up again. But in all honesty she’s expecting him to tell her to fuck off, to run as soon as he sees her, to make everything worse rather than better. She’s even half expecting Clint to be there waiting for her because she’s tripped some alarm.

What she’s not expecting is to find the Cavalry waiting in a black jeep 200 yards from Barton’s house. 

She knows straight away that the game’s up, but pride makes her sit on the hood instead of climbing in, forcing May to climb out if she wants to talk. 

“So.” Natasha keeps her eyes fixed on the wall of Barton’s house, barely visible from here through the trees. “What gave me away?”

“You rushed it.” May doesn’t bother climbing onto the hood; she’s standing in Natasha’s blind spot, more from a desire to irritate than out of any malicious intent, Natasha’s sure. 

“I didn’t think there’d be anyone watching this closely.”

May doesn’t bother saying anything in return, but her silences were always amazingly eloquent, and Natasha worries the skin next to her thumbnail with her teeth as she thinks. 

“There shouldn’t be anyone watching this closely,” she says at last, and only now does she turn her head enough that she can watch May out of her peripheral vision. “Coulson was the only one who would have bothered.”

May shrugs. “Could be he arranged for people to do that for him.”

It’s possible, Natasha supposes, but if he had arranged that before he died, she thinks he would have asked her. Certainly not May. There was too much unfinished business between them for that, and May was too firmly chained to her desk. 

Natasha frowns. When was the last time she saw May up in administration? She’s not there that often, but Avengers’ business generates more paperwork than most people appreciate and she is the team member most temperamentally suited to handle it, and she knows she hasn’t seen May since before the New York attacks. 

It makes her suspicious, but it’s not conclusive proof – S.H.I.E.L.D needs all the good agents it can get its hands on right now. The Battle of New York, after all, has cracked the established monoliths of power in the world, and Natasha has been here before, watched the Russian state she thought would last forever crumple and fall, and knows the best line of defense is a good offence. 

But if May was on the rota of active agents again, Natasha thinks she would have seen her. The Avengers are an acquired taste. Maybe Coulson could have handled them, but there is a high turnover rate for the role of liaison. May would be more than a match for Stark and Rogers – and if she’s a field agent again, Natasha suspects she would have been at least auditioned for the role. 

Unless there is another operation that she is on. Something that Natasha, who knows more about S.H.I.E.L.D than anyone bar Fury himself, has heard nothing about. 

There are only a very few operations that might have that level of security. Natasha can think of a couple without trying, but the fact that it’s May who’s involved and she is _here_ , _now_ suggests its own answer. 

“So,” she turns to May, meets her gaze steady and unconcerned. “Why did Coulson send you rather than coming himself, then?” 

“It’s not an either/or situation.” The voice behind her is completely unexpected and it takes everything she has not to let her shock show on her face. 

Instead she forces herself to relax, reminds herself that this is someone she trusts – or trusted at the very least – with her life, and turns. 

Once, back in the mists of her former life, she remembers seeing a Dowager Duchess, a relic from the even older days when Saint Petersburg had yet to become Petrograd or Leningrad. It was in Austria, she thinks, though the details are hazy now and it might have been Bucharest or Paris. Details don’t matter; what remains is the image: the Duchess turning; the poise of her bearing; the hauteur with which she held her head; the judgment in her eye and dismissal to be read in the raise of an eyebrow. 

Even when Natasha had fired she had looked unsurprised, merely contemptuous as the blood bloomed across her chest, pooling and dripping from her pearls and onto the lining tablecloth, her posture still erect in death. The picture remained as Natasha dropped the pistol, turned, shucked her waitress’s apron and cap and slipped from the restaurant. It has remained with her since, a talisman of the past, of dignity and pride. It’s one she recalls and wears close to the surface of her skin when she needs armor against the shocks of life, and it’s the image she holds in her mind as she turns around now to face what she thought was her past. 

—

“Status, Hawkeye.”

Clint squints at the earpiece. Somehow it’s no longer in his ear. Instead it’s lying on top of a pile of smashed glass slightly further than arm’s reach away. 

Which means he’s lying on the floor. Again. 

For a second he wonders what it would mean if he just stayed here; let the battle go on without him. He’s too old for this shit, he thinks as his muscles complain at his attempt to sit up. Too old and too tired. 

The squawking intensifies, and he reaches out to snag the com, still unsure whether he’ll answer it or crush it and hope people believe it was collateral damage. 

He’s just managed to snag it when the light from the (smashed) window is blocked out and Tony – _Iron Man_ – is hovering there. Clint can feel his judgment through however many layers of metal make up his face plate. 

“Enjoying your nap, granddad?” The amplifications from the suit do nothing to mask the disdain in Tony’s voice. “Only we’ve got a situation out here that could really use your help.” He sniffs. “If you think you’re up to it.” 

Clint doesn’t bother with a response. He hooks the ear-piece back in and checks that he still has his quiver and that his bow is in one piece. 

“Gimme a lift back to the street,” he says when he’s as ready as he’s going to be, and Tony sighs, but holds out an arm and Clint grips as tightly as he can as they plunge downwards. 

He doesn’t bother with the debrief after. It’s part of the problem, he knows. Why should the others trust him when he doesn’t pull his weight? Doesn’t even bother doing the things he could do? But the fact is, he _can’t_. 

All he wants right now is a hot bath and a pair of tweezers so he can pick out the glass that’s left in the wounds from that window. And maybe a beer. And a tube of deep heat for his back. 

He’s not up to talking to people. Not able to summon enough political sense to pick his way through the minefield of a debrief. Certainly not able to go to the Tower afterwards and play pretend that everything is _fine_ and they’re one big happy _team_. He might make the effort if Natasha was there – she’s been watching him too closely for comfort recently – but she’s off somewhere that’s too important to bother telling him about, so he doesn’t even feel a momentary pang before he slips away and heads home. 

_Fucking superheroes_ he thinks when he finally gets to slide into the too hot bath he’s been promising himself since before the fight started. They’ve forgotten what it means to be human. It’s a luxury Clint doesn’t have, and here and now, with the bubbles popping around him and leaving scummy foam in their wake, he’s not sure if he’s grateful or jealous of that. 

—

“You’re alive.”

It’s hardly the most insightful thing she could say, but under the circumstances Natasha feels she’s entitled to a little leeway. 

Phil, as he always has, seems to read her mind, and the corners of his mouth twist up in the barest facsimile of a smile in response. 

The silence settles heavily around them, only disturbed by the distant chirping of birds and the soft noises of May cleaning her gun on the other side of the jeep. It’s not uncomfortable – they’ve known each other too long, too intimately for that – and Natasha uses the time to consider what she should say. 

There isn’t much point in asking how or why. The how is always _S.H.I.E.L.D_ , where job contracts last longer than death, and the why. Well. It will be complicated, because it always is, and now is probably neither the time, nor the place. So, she swallows back the angry joy that she feels when she glances at Phil, and tries to focus on why she’s here. 

“So, Barton.” Phil looks relaxed, but Natasha can see the way he’s forcing his shoulders down, timing his breaths. “What’s he done now?”

“Why would you think he’s done anything?”

He shrugs. “Why else would you be here?” 

“I might want to keep an eye on big brother.” 

Phil inclines his head in acknowledgment, and doesn’t argue, but they both know she’s lying. She waits a beat before letting herself relax properly, sitting close enough together on the hood of the jeep that she can feel Phil’s warmth through the layers of his suit. 

“I’m worried about him.” 

She feels more than hears the noise that Phil makes to acknowledge the words, but she doesn’t look around. Her eyes are suspiciously misty, and that just isn’t _her_. 

“What’s wrong?” he asks at last. “I’ve been watching you all, and you all seem to be doing okay.” 

She shrugs, struggling now to voice her fears. “He’s not made any plans for Thanksgiving.” 

Next to her Phil goes very still. “And Christmas?” She shakes her head, small and controlled. “Oh.”

“Yes.” The sky is losing light now, twilight creeping up on them. “He’s covering, though. Doing enough so no one suspects.”

“Not even the others?”

She shakes her head. “Especially not them. He’s never let them get close enough for them to be able to tell the difference.”

Phil sounds tired when he sighs, and Natasha wonders what S.H.I.E.L.D has been doing to him since he came back. 

“He’s good at hiding when he’s hurt.”

“He’s like a cat that way.” The words make Phil smile, and she knows he’s remembering the time in Boston when Clint has made it across the rooftops of the city with a kitten tucked into his flack vest. It’s what she wanted, to remind him that things used to be good, but it doesn’t make the fact any the less true. “I don’t want him to crawl off and die alone.” 

Phil doesn’t spout platitudes. He’s always trusted her judgment, and apparently not even death has changed that. 

“What’s causing it?” he asks instead. 

“New York.” She bites her thumbnail, looks at the lights of Barney’s house that are twinkling now in the distance. “The team.” 

“The team?” There’s an edge to Phil’s voice and she shakes her head. 

“Not like that. He’s always been his own worst critic, and now it’s like he’s measuring himself up to the others, and it’s just confirming that he’s not good enough.” 

A small animal moves nearby, a crack of branches in the growing dark. May’s gun is back together before it finishes moving and she’s scanning for movement, for threat, but neither Natasha nor Phil respond. 

“That’s always been his biggest fear,” Phil says. “Has he talked about what Loki said to him?”

“Not to me.”

Phil nods, as if his suspicions are confirmed. “And he’s never been a fan of the psych team.” 

It’s not news to Natasha. She treats therapy like a game she can play against herself, and she’s always liked winning, but Clint is a very different person and Natasha suspects that a childhood that involved child services fueled his distrust. 

“I don’t know what to do.” The confession is unnecessary – she would hardly be here if she had a better plan – but it makes her feel better to have said it at last. 

“We need to make him see how important he is,” Phil says, his words loud in the night air. “He needs to feel he’s needed and valued.” 

“And how do we do that?” The words are bitter, but Natasha is genuinely curious. “When he won’t talk to me? Never mind to someone who could actually _help_ him?”

For a moment she thinks the questions are rhetorical, that Phil won’t – can’t answer, but then he sighs, turns, finally, to face her.

“Tell me,” he says, and his expression is earnest, hopeful. “What do you know about Inception?” 

—

There are times, even now, when Clint remembers that he’s more than an Avenger. That first and foremost he is a S.H.I.E.L.D agent, and that no matter how blotted his copybook is, they will keep calling on him. Mostly, he suspects, because he’s useful. 

One day old age will catch up with him, if he’s lucky. If he isn’t there’ll be an injury that will ruin his aim, make him functionally useless, if it doesn’t kill him outright. Whatever it is, he has an expiration date, and he doesn’t blame S.H.I.E.L.D for making the most of him while they can. 

If he’s being honest, he enjoys it. Especially when he gets to work with Natasha. 

She’s been distant for the past few weeks, ever since he fucked up about the whole Thanksgiving thing, but now they’re together, trapped in a one-bed apartment in Anchorage while they wait to see if the gunrunner they’re tracking actually does have a lead on the alien tech he boasted about in a bar a few nights ago. 

It’s awkward to begin with. Clint doesn’t want to bring up the whole feelings thing, but he doesn’t know what to say without it. But they have a history of this, shared space and warm silences, and it doesn’t take long for him to relax. 

The surveillance is dull as hell. 

“How long do you think we’ll get away with doing this?” He asks mostly for something to say, but he is genuinely interested as well. S.H.I.E.L.D’s been good to him, better than he deserved maybe, and he’ll be sorry when he can’t do this anymore. When the options are superhero or nothing. 

“S.H.I.E.L.D work?” She shrugs. “Not sure. As long as we can, but something is bound to break my cover sooner or later.” She looks at him. “You’ll get away with it for longer.”

“Yeah.” He knows this one. “No one ever looks at me.”

She snorts. “Or you don’t need to go undercover in your line of work.”

“I’m not you, but even I would find it hard to take on a hit with a crew of paparazzi following me.” She nods, and they lapse into silence for a while. “You think the others get this kind of problem?”

She raises an eyebrow, efficiently eloquent as always. “Look at Stark,” she says. “He’s a poster boy for what this life does to you.”

“Poor little rich boy.” He snorts. “My heart bleeds for him.” 

He notices too late that Natasha is looking at him oddly.

“You really believe that?”

“Yeah.” The words are out now. It’s too late to take them back. “I mean. You and Phil always struggled with him, right? And that ego…” he sucks the air in over his teeth. “He’s hardly a team player.” 

“And the others?”

Clint shrugs. “Steve’s okay I guess. Never saw what the fuss was about him before, but he’s been decent enough to work with. Better than Bruce.” He grimaces. “Now there’s a man with issues.” 

Natasha raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t say anything. They keep watching the grainy feed from the flat below. 

“They’re not bad,” he says at last. “Just… they’re not you and Phil.”

“But I’m still there.” 

“It’s not the same.” Clint can’t take his eyes away from the screen now. “Before it was _us_. Now it’s super-sized egos and men that can’t be hurt.” He looks at his hands, the familiar callouses on his fingers. “Where am I meant to fit into that?”

“You’re part of the team as well,” she tells him. “There’s a reason for that.”

“Yeah,” he says. “Right.”

“You are.” Her voice is earnest, and he knows she thinks she’s telling the truth, but even that irritates him right now. 

“For the moment.” He scowls at the screen. “How long will that last? I’m not indestructible like Banner or Rogers. I’m not smart like you or Stark, and Phil’s not around to cover my back anymore. I’m gonna get taken out.” 

She reaches out and rests a hand on his arm. “You miss him?”

It cracks the shell of his anger, and he slumps. “Like you wouldn’t believe.” He takes a breath, lets the warmth of her hand ground him. “He was the first person who believed in me, you know. Without him I’d never have found a place here; I’d have run years ago. He was the one who made this home, who trusted me enough to bring you in when you needed it. It was always him.”

She links her fingers with his. “I miss him too.” 

“I know.” He feels her moving closer and relaxes, rests his forehead against hers. “But you’re good at coping. You’re good at _people_.”

“It’ll get easier.”

“Maybe.” His voice is bleak, and he doesn’t think she believes him. Why should she when he doesn’t believe himself? 

“It will.” She kisses his temple. “I’ll make sure it does.”

“I wish you could.” 

He’s going to say something else. Tell her how much she means to him, something that would mean that when the worst happens she won’t blame herself, because he knows there’s nothing she can do to save him. But there’s the sound of gunfire from downstairs and in the ensuing chaos and clean up, he loses the words, and by the time they’re on the way back to the Tower he’s more concerned with working out how he can escape back to his apartment, and the opportunity is lost. 

__

“Talk to me about dreamshare,”

Phil is facing away from her, and not by the twitch of a muscle does he show that she’s shocked him, even though she knows she hadn’t made any noise coming into the room.

It’s par for the course though. She remembers how she and Clint used to try getting a rise out of him, back in the day, when S.H.I.E.L.D was new to her and scoring points against her handlers seemed to be a worthwhile game. They’d never managed it, not on their best day, not even that time in the hospital when Phil had been sedated and they’d had the run of the air vents. 

It’s comforting in a way, that this has stayed the same, even when so much else has changed, and she wraps that comfort around herself like a blanket as she takes a seat in front of the desk of Phil’s new office – if a memorabilia crammed room on a plane actually constitutes an office. 

“That’s what you want to start with?” he asks at last, turning around and fixing her with that small half smile she remembers so well. 

She shrugs. “You would prefer me to ask you to explain yourself? Why you’ve let us mourn you? Why you’ve let Clint think he’s killed you?” The muscles of his jaw tighten and he looks away. “I didn’t think so.” She waits for him to sit down before she resumes. “So, tell me about dreamshare. Tell me how we can make things better for Clint, before it’s too late.” 

For a second she thinks he might answer her questions, but there is a clatter of noise from outside the door, a shriek of laughter and running footsteps – Phil’s new team, who are younger, brighter eyed, less _damaged_ than Natasha can ever remember being – and the moment passes. 

“You may know more about it than me,” he says instead. “It’s military. Developed with the help of a defecting Russian.”

“Red Room?”

He nods. “Mind control was always an interest of theirs.”

She smiles, tightly. He doesn’t need to remind her, and he knows it. The words are payback for her question about Clint. 

“So, it’s another control technique?”

“They may have intended it to be so, but it didn’t turn out to be effective. The results were unpredictable. There are easier methods.” He pauses. “But the military here could overlook that.”

“Why? If there are better ways to control people, then why not use them?”

“It’s not always about control.” He leans forward, crosses his hands on the desk. “Dreamshare is a crude tool if you want to control people, but if you want to find out what they know?” He looks at her. “We have very few defenses when we dream. Your mind is there to be read at will – all you need is the technology and the ability to direct the dreamer’s mind towards the subject you wish to discover.” 

“And the military were interested in that?”

“Oh.” His smile grows, but his eyes are cold. “No. They only saw it in terms of _training_ , desensitizing men to killing. It was the security services who saw it’s _potential_.”

“And S.H.I.E.L.D?”

“Didn’t think the security services were ready for that sort of responsibility,” Phil says, and his smile is genuine now. 

Who watches the watchmen, they ask, and Natasha knows the answer. It’s S.H.I.E.L.D. It’s always S.H.I.E.L.D. 

Sometimes technology advances further and faster than society can bear; sometimes there needs to be checks and balances; and when this happens, when it has happened, when it will happen, there’s S.H.I.E.L.D. 

And who watches them? There isn’t an answer to that, not one that she’s comfortable with, and when she looks up she catches an expression of fellow feeling on Phil’s face. 

“So, S.H.I.E.L.D holds the technology now?” She doesn’t bother acknowledging the reasons – some things are safer left unsaid. 

Phil inclines his head. “There are some devices in the private sector, but we monitor them closely.”

“And does the private sector realize this?”

Phil laughs. “It’s unlikely. We keep the technology underground.”

“Where it can be useful?”

“And deniable.”

“And the scientists?”

“Funding.” Phil shrugs. “Offer an academic tenure and their hearts and minds follow.”

“And those who don’t?”

“Keep them on their toes with occasional raids. Let them think they’re flying under the radar. Infiltrate the groups where necessary.”

“The usual techniques then.”

Phil nods. “It keeps the field lively, advancing…”

“And means it poses no threat.”

“Exactly.”

“So, how do you think it can help Clint?” 

Phil sighs and stands. There’s a window, and although it only looks out on clouds right now Phil goes to stand at it, as if there is something worth watching on the horizon. 

“Dreamshare is useless as a control mechanism, but as an influencing factor?” He turns around to face her. “It is second to none.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Between control and influence?” The question seems to take Phil aback. “Everything. It’s the difference between removing your free will, turning you into a weapon, and deciding who you kill and giving you a cause you are willing to live and die for.”

“And yet the end result is the same.” Her words are cold, and she does nothing to warm them. Whether it’s through outright control or the manipulation of pretty words and prettier ideals, loss of agency is still her biggest fear. 

Phil shakes his head. “I don’t think so. There’s a world of difference between The Winter Soldier and Captain America after all.”

She bows her head under the words. There might be, but in certain fundamental respects they are the same, and she’s suddenly breathlessly unsure about whether this is the right thing to do for Clint. 

Phil seems to follow her thoughts. He comes to sit on the desk in front of her. “Inception is an art,” he says, “not a science. It’s a suggestion that the mind can reject.”

“Then how does it work?”

“You find an idea that feels right to the dreamer’s mind – that appeals to their heart – and you present that while they’re asleep.” She frowns and he reaches down to turn her face to his. “We wouldn’t suggest anything to Clint that would hurt him. All we would do is to remind him that he has people who love him, people who would care if he wasn’t here.”

“How?”

“Family.” There’s something complicated in Phil’s expression that she can’t decode. “He’s always wanted family, more than anything else.”

She frowns. It’s not what she would have thought he’d wanted, but then she remembers Barney, how very important he was to Clint no matter how many times he got hurt; about Clint’s apartment and how he cares for its ridiculous tenants, and she thinks she might understand. “So, we give him one?”

“A home and a wife and a family.” Phil nods. 

“He’s not going to accept that,” Natasha says. “Not out of the blue. It needs to fit in with his life. He needs to accept it, if he’s going to trust it.” She smiles. “Maybe you don’t remember, but he doesn’t trust easily, and Loki did nothing to help him with that.”

Phil frowns and pauses, running through and discarding ideas. “He’d be entitled to leave,” he says at last. “After something like Loki and New York.”

“And he uses that to, what?” She raises an eyebrow. “Go home?”

“Something like that.” Phil stands up again, moves back towards the window. “It should be something in the countryside, I think. A farm or a cabin. Nothing in a city, or anywhere that would remind him of New York.”

“A farm.” She smiles. “You want to give him literal roots?”

“Why not? Something to make him feel anchored to the land and the world.”

“As metaphors go, it’s hardly subtle.”

“It doesn’t need to be. It just needs to feel right while he’s there.”

“So, he gets leave from Fury, and goes back to his _homestead_ , and then what?” She struggles to keep the skepticism out of her voice. “Who is this wife he has?”

“Nobody from the real world. That’s too dangerous. This isn't about making him fall in love with someone – it’s about giving him a sense of belonging, of permanency.”

“And how does this mystery woman appear in the dream?”

“We use a forger.”

The term is not familiar, and Natasha frowns. 

“It’s someone in the dream who doesn’t wear their own face,” Phil says, catching her expression. “They move between bodies, so they can be anything they want – anyone the dreamer wants to see.” 

“You know someone like this? Someone who can forge a wife for Clint?”

Phil nods. “I know several, but the one I want for this job is Bobbi Morse.”

The name is familiar. Someone from the other parts of S.H.I.E.L.D. The ones without a public face, but with personal connections to the people Natasha works most closely with. She nods. “She knows Clint. I would trust her.”

“That was what I thought.”

It’s all starting to feel very real now, this plan of a farm and a wife who is only a stranger wearing a false face. “What will you be doing?” she asks Phil, because as things stand, he can’t play a role in the dream. The way Clint feels, it would overwhelm everything else, she knows. 

“I’ll act as what they call the architect,” Phil says. “I’ll create the structure of the dream. It will be up to you and Bobbi to give him the message.”

“You want me to be in the dream?” 

Phil nods. “Of course. Who knows Clint better than you?”

“Who should I be?” She’s never tried dreamshare, but she knows that this needs to happen soon, and she isn’t confident she can learn to forge in time. 

“Yourself.” Phil smiles at the look on her face. “He trusts you. You being there will add validity. Bobbi will treat him like he’s valuable to her, but you can talk to him explicitly.”

It makes sense, and she nods. “And who will forge the children?”

“No one. There’s no need.” Phil looks rueful. “Put Clint in a secure environment where he’s loved and he will dream up children for himself.”

There’s no space for this in their lives, she knows. Part of the price they pay for doing what they do. Yet sometimes that price seems harder to pay than others, and she wonders for a second what Phil’s perfect dream would look like. 

It’s a foolish distraction though, nostalgia for a life that never was, and she shakes herself free of it. “Who else will be involved?”

“Melinda.” Phil frowns. “I can get the PASIV from the locker, and there’s a contact I have in Mombassa who can get me the drugs, but we need an experienced dreamer to keep this on track while I’m awake.”

It doesn’t surprise her that May knows the technology, nor that Phil would want her involved, and she nods. 

“And when do we do this?”

Phil meets her eyes, steady and unafraid. “Soon,” he says. “While there’s still time.”

— 

Clint doesn’t mean to get Natasha a cat. It just kind of ends up _happening_. 

It’s got to be scary, being a small cat in a big city, and the aftermath of a S.H.I.E.L.D op is hardly the calmest of times, so when he sees the small grey cat with the oddly short tail hiding against the wall of the warehouse that’s about to blow, he doesn't even think about it. He grabs it, and holds it as gently as he can while he sprints for safety, and doesn’t even complain when it rewards him doing its best to scratch his arms to shreds. 

He drops it when they get outside, and doesn’t think about it again until the on site med team scowl at him and tell him he’ll need rabies shots unless he can prove that the animal that bit him is clear. 

“It’s fine.” Clint is better now about accepting treatment, but he’s had rabies shots before and they are Not Fun. “It was just scared.”

“Yeah, right.” The paramedic looks unimpressed. “Show me the cat and I’ll let you off.”

“Aw, dude. It’s a _cat_. It’s not going to stick around here, is it?” He turns and gestures at the mayhem behind him, which is when he sees the cat. It seems to have recovered from its nerves, because it’s sitting just behind his foot, just where Clint would tread on it if he wasn’t careful. 

Which is how Clint ends up bringing the cat home with him. And discovering that the cat does not approve of Lucky or dogs in general, and seems to be very unsure about Clint himself. 

“You gotta take it,” he tells Natasha, holding the cat out to her. “He hates me.”

Natasha looks about as unimpressed as the cat does. “He doesn’t hate you.”

“He went through my _entire apartment_ until he found my report for this op and he urinated on it _while he was looking right at me_.”

He waits, patiently, for Natasha to stop laughing before holding the cat out to her again. 

This time she holds out her arms and the cat climbs right into them, butting his head at her chin until she skritches him. If the purring is anything to go by, she has the magic touch. 

It’s a done deal after that, and Natasha seems to take well to cat ownership. Clint feels it’s his duty to stick around for a bit, and they both ignore him with similar expressions of disdain, and Clint really wishes he didn’t find that as relaxing as he does. 

Things have been off recently. He’s not sure what’s going on, or what to say to make it better, but as the afternoon drifts on he doesn’t feel that oppressive stress to be _normal_. Instead he talks to Natasha about stupid things, inconsequential and fleeting, and he feeds the cat bits of bacon from his sandwich. The sun is starting to set by the time he decides he should head off, but he’s comfortable and reluctant to go, so when Natasha offers him a cup of tea, he lets her persuade him. 

“I love that you do this,” he tells her, gesturing at the trappings of tea making – the samovar, the pot, the china – that she gathers around her. “I can imagine your mom doing this. Your nonna.”

Natasha shrugs, but she looks pleased. “I don’t know,” she says. “I can’t remember. But…”

“It ties you to a past,” Clint says, because he understands that urge. 

She nods, and concentrates on pouring the water onto the leaves and Clint feels content for the first time in months. 

He lets her pour for him, follows the tradition he knows she favors and drinks the tea through a sugar cube held between his teeth.

It’s sweet and smokey and familiar, but the edge of bitterness is unusual.

“Is it normally like this?” he asks. “I don’t remember.”

She nods. “Russian tea is always bitter,” she tells him. “It’s salted with the tears of our history.”

It occurs to him that he could call her on her bullshit, but she is sipping her own tea, calm and beautiful with the cat supine and happy across her knee. She never does anything without a reason, and he loves her, in his own way. 

Clint meets her eyes and finishes his tea.

—

If anything surprises Natasha, it’s how well Clint takes to the dream.

He accepts _everything_. The farm, the wife, the life on the land… And Phil was exactly right. No sooner does he see Bobbi – or Laura as he calls her with a warmth Natasha has never heard in his tone – then she hears the screams of laughter as children appear outside, playing on a tyre swing that wasn’t there a second before. 

And he’s delighted to see her – calling to Laura that Natasha is there, and does she have dinner on? It seems, with the perfect clear logic of a dream, that this is somewhere that Clint has always carried inside him, always expected to return to.

Natasha knows the work that Phil put into creating this world, but it’s Clint himself who brings life to its bones, lights up the dream with affection and emotion, until she’s not sure that it needs Bobbi or her to plant the idea that he belongs, that he’s needed. 

They play their parts though, and when she stands with Clint on the porch of his farm, glasses of lemonade in their hands watching his wife chasing the children down towards the creek, it is the easiest conversation she has ever had. 

“They’re beautiful,” she says, and she’s surprised to find she means it.

Clint nods, a look of fierce pride on his face. “They are,” he says. “I don’t know what I’d do without them, Tasha.”

“They’re not the only ones who love you, you know.”

He turns to her, and wraps his arm around her shoulder to pull her in close. “I know that,” he says, his words muffled in her hair. “And I love you too.”

“But it’s different though.” The words are tinged with regret, and Clint’s arm tightens around her. 

“It is,” he says, his voice gentle. “But that doesn’t make it bad. It just helps to have something outside that life, something that’s mine. That they can’t touch.” They watch his family together, as the sun sets. “They remind me why I do this. Why I need to keep doing it and come back afterwards.”

The words stick with her as she wakes up, as they pack away the PASIV and she lets Phil and the others out. As she tucks a blanket around Clint where he’s slumbering on the sofa, and as she picks up the cat and seeks her own bed. 

Sleep is a long time coming for her, and when it does it’s tinged with sadness and regret. For Clint who only gets what he deserves in a dream. For herself and the life she can’t let herself even dream of. For all of them, really. The cat lies next to her head, and it’s warm, and its purr is almost tangible in the dark.

Eventually she sleeps. 

There isn't time to speak to Clint next morning. She notices that he looks relaxed, is smiling as he passes her a coffee that she barely has time to swallow before she dashes out to collect Captain America from his playdate and take him on a rescue mission. 

And then the world falls apart and Clint and dreamshare and inception are the very last things on her mind.  
__

Clint knows something has changed as soon as he opens his eyes. 

Natasha’s sofa is lumpy, the blanket over him is scratchy and too warm, there are gaps in his memory and his mouth is dry, but his heart is at rest for the first time he can remember. 

He’s not sure if he should ask Natasha about it, but in the end he doesn’t get the chance. She dashes out on some S.H.I.E.L.D thing with Steve that he’s thankfully escaped before she’s even finished the coffee that he’s made her. 

He’s not quite ready to head home though, so he wanders over to the Tower. There’s usually someone around there, and he heads to the kitchen and puts on a pot of coffee on the basis that coffee is always welcome. 

Sure enough, Tony shows up before it’s finished brewing and Clint snags him a mug, fills it, and passes it over before Tony can even ask. 

“You need milk for that?” he asks, pulling the fridge open and frowning at the miscellany of items he finds. “I mean, I’m not sure we got any but…”

“Nah.” Tony’s voice is muffled by the mug. “’S’good like this.”

“Great.” Clint’s found some blueberries and eggs. “I’ll do some pancakes though, if you want them.”

“Sure.” There’s an edge to Tony’s tone now, and when Clint turns around, his hands full, Tony’s staring at him with an odd expression. 

It’s only then that Clint realizes that this is the first time he’s done this, that he’s bothered to make coffee for anyone on his team, much less breakfast. He almost falters, but Tony starts rooting in a cupboard and emerges with flour and syrup and puts them on the counter next to Clint with a ridiculously hopeful expression. It’s enough to quell his doubt, and by the time they’re sitting down to breakfast together, Clint has almost forgotten that he had any doubt in the first place. 

“Not bad,” Tony says as he uses the last bit of pancake to mop up as much syrup as he can manage. “You missed your calling.”

“Yeah.” Clint grins down at his plate. “The shooting thing was always my second choice.”

It makes Tony laugh, but he looks rueful. “You and me both.”

Clint raises an eyebrow, and Tony shrugs at him.

“Well, I’m not gonna last forever, even as Iron Man, am I?” His face twists in a way that Clint’s only ever seen in the mirror before. “At least if I’m designing your kit there’s a reason to keep me on the team.” 

“Yeah,” Clint says through a suddenly dry throat. “Cuz that’s the only reason we’d keep you around.”

“That and the money,” Tony says. His voice is brighter now, but Clint can hear an edge of bitterness to it that he thinks he’s been missing until now. 

“Better not be a requirement.” Clint swirls the last of his coffee in his mug, considers whether it’s too lukewarm, downs it anyway. “Or I’m fucked.”

“But pancakes.” Tony puts his mug down and stretches. “There’s always a market for breakfast food here.” 

It’s a comforting idea. Clint knows he should push it away, but he’s still lazy and happy from his night on Tasha’s sofa, and he can’t be bothered to fight. 

“Sure,” he says, starting to gather up the plates. “Once I’m done with fighting I’ll set up as a short order cook for you.” 

“Glad to hear it. We can’t let these superpower types take over.” He’s interrupted by JARVIS’s cool tones reminding him he needs to be at the airport in the next half hour, but he pauses as he stands up. “Tell you what, why don’t you come out to the West Coast with me?”

The words conjure up the picture of warmth and sunshine, and it suits how Clint feels somehow. Something rural, he thinks, with more open space than New York. Maybe some trees.

“Sure,” he says, which is how he manages to miss the Winter Soldier turning up and S.H.I.E.L.D falling apart. 

—

It’s lucky he knows her so well, otherwise it would be torture being so far away while everything goes wrong. 

But he does know her, so he keeps an eye on the figures in the background and manages via the miracle of social media to get a reasonably accurate picture of what’s happening. 

Still, it’s hard, and he’s glad that it’s him and Tony, trying to work out what’s going on together, trying to work out what they can _do_ together. 

Any plans they have to head back east are quickly scuppered though when it turns out that there is a significant Hydra presence in their own backyard. 

“Glad you asked me to come now?” he manages through panting breaths as Tony catches him mid drop from the top of a water tower. 

“Oh, sure.” Tony jets them away from the worst of the current firestorm, looking for somewhere high to drop Clint. “Don’t know what my shoulders would have done without being wretched from their sockets on the regular.”

“Keeps you limber,” Clint says, then he’s jumping, rolling, firing in one smooth movement, and there’s no time for more words. 

Still, when they’ve taken out this cell and regrouped so Tony can check on Pepper, and they can start assessing which threat needs dealing with next, Clint finds that he’s actually relaxed. 

It’s odd, he thinks, that moments of crisis should make him finally accept his place in this team. It took years for him to learn to trust Coulson, after all, and if Natasha fitted in more easily, well, that was down to her particular skill set and the fact that Phil had done all the legwork. 

Something about the thought nags at him though, not in a destructive way, just in a way that raises a warning flag, and he decides that he’ll work out what’s worrying him later – if he manages to survive this. 

“Fury’s dead,” Tony tells him when he comes back into the room. He’s still holding his phone, and is looking at it like he can’t believe he isn’t dreaming. 

“Who told you?”

“Pepper. She heard it from… oh, someone.” Tony shrugs. “I kinda blanked out when she said that.”

“Yeah.” Clint scratches his head. “I wouldn’t believe that until you see his body, and even then…”

“You think he’d play this?”

“I think he’d play anything if he saw a profit in it.”

“How is being _dead_ profitable?” Tony looks shell shocked and Clint has to bite back his smile. 

“If you’re dead, no one is gonna be looking for you.” He sees the light dawning for Tony, and holds up his hand, because he’s learned the hard way that you can never be sure who’s listening. “But that could just be wishful thinking.”

Tony takes his lead, and lets the subject drop. 

It’s a moment of calm in what feels like an eternity of fighting. And the fights are harder than normal. S.H.I.E.L.D trains its agents well, and the people he’s fighting know all his tricks. Worse still, he’s fighting friends, and it’s like the helicarrier all over again. Honestly, if it wasn't for Tony fighting next to him, Clint isn’t sure he could do it. 

Tony seems to understand though. He never says anything, but he’s _there_ – putting his hand on Clint’s shoulder, checking in with him, joking with him when everything is so awful that to talk normally is impossible. 

They’re fighting like a team now, the ease of long familiarity created by practice and awareness, and Clint thinks they’ve both gained a new respect for each other. They certainly have a level of trust they didn’t have a month ago. 

And it’s Tony who notices when Natasha dumps all of S.H.I.E.L.D’s data out into the public domain. 

It’s a brave move, Clint knows this, and nothing but the most extreme circumstances could have made her do this. But he still has that suspicion at the back of his mind, so he grabs what he can. He can go through it later, but data like this won’t stay public for long, and he’d rather have the whole picture and not just the be piecing together a picture from the echoes left when the dust settles. 

Which isn’t to say that the data _doesn’t_ pose an immediate concern. 

“What do you mean?” Tony asks. “Why do we need to leave now?”

“Think about it. Everything is out there now. Everything S.H.I.E.L.D had on us.”

“So? My life’s been an open book since I was born.”

It’s an arrogance that would have frustrated Clint to rage not so long ago, but now he reaches out and rests two fingers on the back of Tony’s hand. 

“And S.H.I.E.L.D has information about the people close to us as well.”

Tony’s face goes pale. “Pepper?”

“Yeah. So…”

“We need to leave now.”

They’re in the air before Tony stops to think. 

“Who are you protecting?” he asks. “It can’t be Natasha, or you’d have been worried before.”

Clint considers lying, but after the last few weeks, it feels pointless. 

“Barney,” he says. “My brother.” 

“I didn’t know you had a brother.” Tony doesn't sound angry, just thoughtful and Clint shrugs. 

“We’re not close,” he says. “But I have him protected. Had him protected.”

“Through S.H.I.E.L.D?”

Clint nods. “Perk of the job, only…”

“Not so perky now?”

“Yeah. If there’s anyone with a score to settle with me, they’d go for him first. My unprotected flank.”

Tony reaches out, touches his arm. “Not unprotected. He’s a Barton. You guys are full of surprises.” 

It’s strange how much comfort he gets from those words, even after he and Tony split up and he’s on his way to Barney’s godforsaken ranch in the middle of nowhere. 

He’s tried calling – he’s not stupid – but there’s no answer and he is completely unsurprised when Barney’s place is deserted, a thin film of dust on the surfaces inside suggesting he’s been gone for longer than this has been going on. 

He doesn’t know what else he can do. Either Barney’s got out and is safe, or someone has him. In either case he’ll find out eventually, so he heads back to New York, parks up, and goes to get a coffee from the place next to Stark Tower before he heads home. 

He’s waiting for his latte when someone taps him on the shoulder, and when he turns around it’s not really a surprise to see Barney behind him. Neither are Barney’s first words when they sit down at a little table outside.

“So,” Barney says. “What do you know about inception and why would someone want to do that to you?”

—

It’s enough to make Clint run. 

He doesn’t know much about dreamshare in general, or inception in particular, but he _does_ remember the last person to talk to him about it.

Phil Coulson.

Phil. 

His handler. The man who made him stick with S.H.I.E.L.D when he was young(er) and stupid(er) and had needed somewhere to give him a context before he lost himself altogether. His friend. 

But Phil’s dead – or is _meant_ to be dead at the very least – and New York is too busy, too crowded, too _vulnerable_ for Clint to take the time he needs to sort this out. 

He drops back to the Tower first. He wants to leave a note for Tony, because even as he questions himself about who _really_ wants him to leave that note, who _really_ made him let go of his hesitation about being part of the team, he accepts that he is part of the team now, and he owes Tony this. 

He does one better, and finds Tony himself, tired eyed and grey skinned by the coffee pot. 

“Pepper?” he asks, and Tony looks up, sees that it’s Clint, relaxes. 

“She’s fine. I mean, not impressed with me, or S.H.I.E.L.D, or any of this,” he gestures to the window where the systems that once kept them secure are now in tatters and the world is run by mercenaries who are playing off ideologies to hide their greed. “But she’s safe.” He holds out a mug to Clint. “You find your brother?”

“Yes.” The word comes as a surprise to Clint, but he doesn’t try to claw it back. “But he’s said some stuff…”

“And you gotta go.” Tony grins, a quick twist of his mouth that holds no mirth. “I get it. You want some help?”

“Not yet,” Clint says, even though he thought he meant to say no. “But if that changes…”

“You know where to find me.” Tony sighs and finishes his coffee. “It’s better I’m here for now, anyway. There needs to be a focus for the team.”

Clint nods. Without Fury, without Steve, they do need that, but he also knows that Tony would come – will come – when he asks. 

“Dude.” Clint puts down his coffee, gathers Tony awkwardly into his arms. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, and if you need me before then, you call, right?”

“Don’t get sentimental, Merinda.” Tony’s tone is mocking, but his hold is tight around Clint, and, hell, Clint was never expecting that they’d every be _good_ at this human emotion thing. “You owe me a pizza. You’d better come back.”

“Sure.” Clint forces himself to let go, and takes a step back. “And thanks, man.”

He turns and goes then, because it would be too easy to share his suspicions with Tony, and he doesn’t want to do that until he’s worked out if it happened – and why and how… and most importantly what he wants to do about it. 

He needs time, and he needs space, and running is his modus operandi in cases like this. He’s used to being alone with his feelings screaming at him as he flits from state to state, country to country. 

What he’s not expecting is to find Barney waiting by his car for him, his arms crossed and his chin jutted out, like he’s expecting a fight about this. 

It stops him in his tracks, the word _family_ bright and warm in his mind and his chest, and instead of arguing, he chucks his duffle at Barney and unlocks the car. 

They drive in silence, the traffic of the city giving way to the freeway, and, at length, to the relative green of the countryside. 

They don’t even talk when they stop for the night. Barney takes the back seat of the car, and Clint sits under the stars, boots up a lifted laptop, and digs out the thumb drive loaded with as much of S.H.I.E.L.D’s data as he’d been able to lay his hands on. It confirms his worst suspicions, and when Barney wakes up the next morning, he takes one look at Clint’s face and gets behind the wheel without a word. 

It takes five hundred miles for the rage to stop burning in the back of his throat, and another five hundred before he approaches anything like calm. 

By the time he blinks sore eyes and actually sees the road in front of him, they’re in Nebraska. He lets his head drop to the side, rotates it slowly, grunting at the cracking noises, and sighs when it feels as close to mobile as it’s going to get. 

Next to him, Barney is still focused on the road, but the next time they see a diner, he pulls over. 

“Ready to talk now?” The words are carefully confrontational, and Clint nods. 

“If there’s coffee.”

Barney smirks. “I’m sure we can manage that,” he says. “Can probably even stretch to pancakes, if you want some.”

A thousand miles of hunger catches up with Clint, and he’s out of the car before Barney’s even unbuckled his seat belt. 

“Loser pays,” he says, and gives Barney a second so it’s a fair race before heading inside as fast as he decently can. 

“Who was it, then?” Barney asks when they have coffee and pancakes in front of them. “Who did it to you?”

“Natasha and Phil,” Clint says, because even though they’d done their best to cover their tracks, there were still traces to find if you looked in the right place, and Clint knew exactly where to look.

“I thought you said he was dead.” Barney’s lips are tight and Clint knows he’s remembering the one time they’d seen each other since the battle of New York, remembering the things Clint had said about Phil while he was drunk and sentimental. 

“Well, I thought he _was_ dead.”

They busy themselves with pancakes to avoid the awkwardness of eye contact. 

“But, it’s good?” Barney says at last. “That he’s not dead?”

Clint shrugs. “He’s alive and didn’t think it was worthwhile telling me. I wouldn’t call that good.”

“Yeah.” Barney puts his fork down with an audible clink. “And you work for an organization that really prizes information sharing. I mean, I bet they were _all over him_ to get in touch with you.”

Clint squints at Barney, but there’s no judgment on his face and he sighs.

“Okay. Phil might not have had a choice about it, but…”

“But?”

“He’s obviously told Tasha.”

Barney nods. He knows Natasha. Has met her once, and listened to Clint’s stories about her (the edited, _safe_ stories) for years. Which is probably how he recognized her outside his house. And probably why he seems to be holding her responsible for what’s happened. 

“And if he could tell her, he should have told you?”

Clint nods, his face tight, because oddly it’s this that hurts most. “Or she should have.”

“Sucks.”

“It does.”

Barney gestures to the waitress with his cup, and waits until she’s topped him and Clint up. 

“You seem more upset about this than the other thing,” he says when she’s gone again, and Clint nods. 

“I am. I mean, I know Loki controlled me, but they know they can trust me, don’t they?”

Barney blinks at him like he’s confused. “They arranged for you to be mind raped? And you’re worried _they_ don’t trust _you_?”

The words hit Clint like a slap around the face. “Inception’s not like that,” he manages to say, but the words feel weak.

“Really?” Barney looks skeptical. “What is it like then?”

“Phil said that it’s a suggestion the mind is ready for. Like a positive thing, you know?” Clint sips his coffee and tries to remember. “Like hypnotism maybe. You can try and force someone down a road they wouldn’t normally choose, and it might have some effect, but it only really works when you help someone to do something they think is right for them.”

Barney doesn’t look convinced, but at least he doesn’t argue. “How do you know about it?”

“Phil was involved in the early days. He told me about it when we were checking out a dreamshare team after Fisher-Morrow dissolved.”

“That?” Barney raises an eyebrow. “That was huge.”

“Yeah.” Clint remembers the newspaper headlines even now. “Phil thought that the heir had been incepted.”

“Had he?”

“Maybe. We couldn’t prove it. Anyway,” he stares at the last bit of pancake on his plate, “the kid is happier now.”

“What does he do?”

Clint sniggers. “Would you believe he’s set up an artisan bakery in Hobart? We put the team that did it under surveillance for a while, but it wasn’t any good. One of them is too busy with his nursery run to be involved in any criminal activity anymore. One of them is cementing his stranglehold on the business world. S.H.I.E.L.D recruited one pending her PhD results, and two of them, well.” Clint grins. “Better the devils you know, sometimes.”

Barney nods, accepting his words. “So why would Natasha and Phil do this to you?” He fixes Clint with a hard stare. “It might not be mind rape, but it’s not something I’d want to do to a friend.”

It’s a fair question, and Clint pauses, tries to fight the panic that wells up in him when he has to talk about this. 

“Things might not have been going great for me,” he says at last, and darts a glance at Barney, afraid of what he’ll see on his face.

There’s nothing there to read.

“New York?” Barney asks, and waits for Clint’s nod. “She said you were messed up about it. That you weren’t talking to her. I heard her telling the suit she was with that she was worried about you.”

“Yeah.” It doesn't surprise Clint. He knows his masks haven’t been good, knows just how easily Natasha can always see behind them. “They say it’s not my fault, that I was being controlled….”

“Sometimes that doesn’t make it any easier.”

“No.” 

They sit in silent contemplation of a childhood full of shared scars. 

“So you think they were trying to help you out of that?” Barney asks at last and Clint shrugs. 

“I’d need to ask, but yeah. I felt better after it. Part of something bigger than me. Like I was needed.” He looks at the last of the coffee in his cup. “And that made me happy.”

“That was the message they used?” There’s an edge to Barney’s voice that he can’t decipher, and he nods.

“I think so. I trust Tasha.” And he does – it’s why he drank the tea after all. 

Barney doesn’t seem to share his opinion though. “And there’s no other way they could help you?”

“Like you said, S.H.I.E.L.D isn’t that kinda place. I didn’t want to talk about _this_ with anyone from there. It would just make them suspicious.”

“Hide the scars, tell ‘em it’s all fine.” Barney knows the drill as well as he does. “You need to sort your life out, bro.”

“Kinda am, now. Been hanging out with Stark and everything.” It’s a small thing, maybe, but as he tells his brother, he feels how _right_ it is, and some of the residual anger and hurt in his chest starts to loosen. 

Barney’s mouth twists. “Shouldn’t have to rely on dreams and millionaires to make you feel like you’re needed,” he says. “Should have had a childhood that did that for you.”

“We both should,” Clint says, because he gets that now, and Barney might be older than him – but he’s not _that_ much older.  
Barney snorts. “I’m older than you,” he says. “I had enough family to show me it was the last thing I needed. You though…”

“Still have my brother,” Clint says, and reaches out – finally – to touch Barney’s hand. 

—

“What do you want to do now?” Barney asks when they’re back in the car and the emotions of the diner are a comfortable distance behind them. 

“Gonna work out what’s happened,” Clint says, a plan now firmly in mind.

“How?”

“Easy.” Clint grins. “Gonna revisit the scene of the crime.”

—

Despite the saying, there is very seldom honor among thieves. Clint knows this from bitter personal experience. 

It helps, though, when the thief in question is British, ex-army, and you’ve saved his life. Clint is three for three with Eames, but even despite that, he is very glad that Barney is with him with they meet up in Seattle. 

“Barton.” Eames is, as always, a study in louche detachment, but Clint is fairly sure that Arthur is watching from somewhere close by, and that no matter how fast Clint might be on the trigger, Arthur would be faster. 

Instead he nods at Eames, and buys himself a latte, because Eames seems to think that it’s funny to force Clint to visit Starbucks every time they meet. 

“You have it?” he asks as he perches on the stool next to Eames, and Eames nods and uses his toe to push a silver case from his side of the counter to Clint’s. 

“I don’t want to know why you want it,” he says, even though he clearly _does_. Clint has no intention of telling him though, so he just pulls the case closer to him and tries to ignore the way the skin between his shoulder blades is crawling. 

“You know what it’s like,” he says. “Sometimes you get a problem and only dreamwork will do.”

Eames hums non-committedly and scrapes the last of the cream off his hot chocolate. 

“Dangerous times.” He fixes Clint with a look. “I hope you’ve got a good team if you’re planning anything big.”

“Yeah. I got a team.” He does his best to smile and carefully doesn’t ask where Eames got his spare PASIV from, even though he’s fairly sure it’s ex-S.H.I.E.L.D. “But it’s just a personal project.”

“I’ll take your word for it.” Eames pockets the paperback that Clint’s left between their mugs on the counter. He doesn’t bother checking the bills tucked between the pages – though Clint knows that’s less an expression of trust and more the self-confidence that comes from being the baddest mother-fucker in the room. 

Clint gives him enough time to get clear of the building before he leaves. He’s sure he’s still being watched, but he also knows that Barney is out there somewhere and the thought is oddly comforting. 

Even so, it takes all his self-control to wait until they’re free of the city, sure they’re not being followed. 

They find a cheap motel. It’s not much – not pretty, nor sanitary – but it is defensible and Barney arms himself for bear, and gestures to the bed.

“Go on then,” he says. “Go for it.”

Clint nods and sets up the PASIV. He wants to do this, _needs_ to do this, but still… he pauses before he slides the cannula into his wrist. There’s no going back from this, he knows. Once he's confirmed this, he can’t unknow it. 

“You don’t have to,” Barney says at last and Clint shakes himself.

“I do,” he says, and slides the needle in, turns the machine on. 

The dream is immediate and vivid – colors and light and warmth. He knows where he is – knows the farm he’s stood in like the back of his own hand, knows the voices he can hear drifting in from outside like he knows his own. 

He turns, slowly, not trying to separate out what he’s feeling, just allowing himself to _feel_ it. 

His wife is standing in the doorway. She’s watching him, and the expression on her face is like sunshine – like the love he sees in Barney’s eyes, or the pride he used to see on Phil’s face. 

“Clint!” she says, and he knows he hasn’t heard her voice before even while it is as familiar as his own heartbeat. “You’re home!”

—

It takes Natasha weeks to get back to the Tower. It’s better, she thinks, that the fallout and the hearings are kept as far away from the rest of the Avengers as she can manage. 

She walks from the hearing alone, head held high and eyes fixed on the horizon, far beyond the flashing cameras and shouted questions, then does her best to vanish, passing from view like a ghost, making her way home without being noticed. 

Still, she’s feeling battered and vulnerable by the time she gets there, and as the elevator carries her the last distance she uncharitably hopes that the living areas are deserted, that she can get back to her rooms without anyone seeing her. 

She’s not expecting to find Tony waiting for her, a drink in one hand and her new cat winding around his ankles. 

“Clint said you’d want tea,” he says, holding the glass out to her. “But every time I’ve had to face the great and good of this country, only booze gets the taste out of my mouth.” 

“All I said is that not everyone thinks high functioning alcoholism is a life goal,” Clint says, and Natasha, looking around in surprise, finds him sprawled across one of the sofas, clearly relaxed and at home. 

“I don’t think one drink will put me on the road to ruin,” she says to cover her shock and accepts the drink from Tony. It’s a Manhattan, strong and cold and perfectly made. She sips it slowly and bends down so the cat can butt against her fingers. 

“Yeah.” Clint grins at her. “I’m sure Tony said that once too.” 

“Really?” Tony turns on him, though Natasha can tell from the set of his shoulders that he’s relaxed, amused even. “You lie on my sofa? You drink my beer? You eat my pizza? And you insult me?” 

“Someone’s got to.” Clint raises a nearly empty bottle in a mock toast. “You’d be unbearable if I wasn’t here to keep your feet on the ground, Stark.”

“And even the greatest kings of history had a court jester,” Natasha says, straightening up, her face faux serious, and Tony barks out a laugh. 

“You never said that’s what you did in the circus,” he says to Clint. “So, all these stories about spangled outfits and shooting from horseback are just lies?”

“Oh, yeah.” Clint flops back on the sofa, grinning. “Cuz _that_ image is face-saving.” 

“Better than being a clown.”

Clint snorts. “You wear a skin-tight purple outfit with spangles, and tell me that then.” 

It devolves from there. Tony tops off Natasha’s drink and Clint passes her the last slices of pizza. The cat makes a nest between the curve of her leg and the side of the sofa, and for the first time in months she feels relaxed and safe. 

It’s a seductive feeling, and she lets it distract her from her from her fears, lets herself enjoy the company and companionship without questioning it. 

Only when she’s climbing into bed does she remember what she’s done to Clint, and she rolls over, looks at the dark shrouded shapes of her bedroom, and wonders. 

The changes seem so natural, his sense of groundedness so genuine, that she’s not sure if it is a result of the inception, or if it’s down to him getting over his reservations about Tony and letting himself be part of the team. 

Time will tell, she thinks as she falls asleep. 

—

The problem with Hydra is that they seem to be _everywhere_. 

Every time Natasha starts to think they’ve got somewhere, another nest appears and the scabs are ripped off all over again. 

This is it for her, she thinks. She’s not sure she will ever be able to be part of a team that is bigger than the one she is part of right now. The very idea of trusting an extended team to have her back leaves her queasy and unsettled.

Clint is feeling the same, she knows. She sees it in the hard cast to his face when they get back to the Tower; she sees it in his laughter, his camaraderie with his new team. 

It’s not something she would have sought, that’s for sure, but as situations go it could be much worse. She can’t imagine what it would be like to be fighting Hydra without the Avengers to come back to, to lack the solace of a new team. 

They have to fight hard though. Hydra has been smart in gathering S.H.I.E.L.D technology and knowledge and their members were forces to be reckoned with in the politics of the old order. 

She regrets the extent of S.H.I.E.L.D’s former firepower as they limp home from the latest engagement. It’s rare that the whole team fights together, and today was no exception. Maybe it should have been though – even Steve is looking worse for wear, and Clint is wincing each time he puts weight on his right ankle. 

The last thing any of them wants is to get back and find Tony already in his armor, Bruce beside him, clearly waiting for them to get back.

“No rest for the wicked,” Tony says, though his words lack edge. “Not even you, Cap.”

“Aw, Stark.” Clint sounds as tired as Natasha feels, and it makes her smile, though she’s not sure she could say why. “If you were feeling left out, you coulda come with us. You didn’t have to bring a new fight to us.”

“If only it was that simple, Katniss.” Tony’s expression loses the tension it had when he was focused on Steve, and his smile finally reaches his eyes. “Bruce was watching a cell in Minnesota. We think they were waiting for you guys to hit the news in New England before they made their move and…”

“Yeah, yeah.” Clint scrubs his eyes with the heel of his hand. “We’re on it.” 

And the thing is, they _are_. They’re working well together now, have reached an ease of interaction where they can predict how to move, how to support each other. They can fight now in a way that accentuates their strengths and minimizes their weaknesses, and Clint, far from being the eyes from above he was before, moves between them like someone has choreographed his movements. 

But despite that, two major fights in 36 hours take their toll, and by the time they get home again, all Natasha can think of is her bed. 

It’s Steve who stops her, because debriefs are still a thing apparently, but it’s Tony who pushes a mug of hot chocolate into her hand, and Bruce who lets her push her bare feet under the warmth of his thigh. 

“Where’s Clint?” Steve asks, and she opens her eyes, surprised. 

“He was just behind me,” she says, “in the elevator.”

“Well, he’s not here now,” Steve says, the corners of his mouth turning down. “I really wish that…”

“Sorry, sorry.” Clint bounces in with an energy that Natasha can only envy at this point. “Call of nature. You shouldn’t have waited for me.”

Steve frowns, but picks up and the debrief goes as smoothly as these things go. Natasha, sleep deprived and comfortable, watches – more observer than participant – and she’s almost jealous of Clint’s energy. If she didn’t know better she’d think he had managed to grab several hours of sleep since they returned thirty minutes before. 

There’s no way that can have happened though, so she lets herself drift while Steve debriefs the others, holding on until he gives the word and she can finally go to bed. 

Clint’s okay, she thinks as she drifts off. No matter what happened, he’s functioning now. She made the right choice. 

—

For Clint it’s a godsend.

Realistically he knows he doesn’t have a family, but someone has gone to the trouble of making him think this family is real and that? Well, it turns out that _that_ counts. 

Besides, it feels _right_. 

Even if someone attempted inception with him (and he accepts they did, really he does) they’ve only validated something he’s always dreamed of, and it turns out he lacks both the wherewithal and the will to fight that. 

It probably helps that he has a PASIV now and can play with the constructs that someone else has built for him, make them his own. From the first moment he went down and saw what was there, in his unconscious, he knew that this had _potential_. 

He might not be a god, or a genius, or pumped full of super-serum, but this… it gives him – _will_ give him – the ability to keep up with his team. 

If he was a better man, a better human, he’d find another way to do this. He’d find a therapist who could teach him how to roll with the punches, he’d build a proper support network – hell, he might even be able to build a real family of his own. 

It’s a fool’s dream, though. And every time he drags the silver case out from under his bed, he accepts that. 

A dream family can’t be used as leverage against him, can’t be injured, can’t _die_. They’re there when he needs them. They never ask for more than he can give. They never complain when he vanishes, runs off to save the world, prioritizes the safety of people he doesn’t know – will never know – over his commitments to them. 

In a way, he thinks hugging his youngest – his Lila – to him, smelling the sweet warmth of her hair, he’s loving the parts of himself that missed having a secure childhood. But it’s impossible to think about it like that when he’s playing with his children, reading them bedtime stories, waltzing his wife around their kitchen. 

Instead, it’s an oasis of calm, of warmth, of love in the chaotic maelstrom of the rest of his life, and he takes full advantage of it – snatching moments after jobs, spending longer down there when he can afford the time. 

And if sometimes, in the dark of the night, when the med-team has spun him new flesh to replace and repair his injuries and his mind is full of the laughter of children who will never exist outside of the confines of his head, he wonders if he can claim to be human any more – if he is anything more than a construct of technology, engineered for efficiency, well. It is a price he is happy to pay. 

—

They seem to be getting somewhere with Hydra at last, and Clint is finally starting to think that he’ll be able to put Loki behind him. He’s not sure what the Avengers will _do_ once Hydra is gone, but he remembers the cold alien intelligence of the Chitauri, and he’s too smart to hope they’ll be idle for long.

Still, Hydra has been hard work, and Clint is proud of his team for dealing with them. He’s even (daring thought) smug.

Which, of course, is when everything goes wrong.

It doesn’t surprise him at all that Loki’s staff is involved. Clint has spent too long in hospital beds, has had too much time to think while he’s high on painkillers, and he sometimes suspects his life reads like a story written by a sadist. So of course it’s when he’s trying to balance things out, make the tool of his _unmaking_ safe that he’s taken out, taken down, so fast that he doesn’t see it coming. 

Clint’s used to getting injured – it’s a fact of his life. He’s been taking blows that no one should ever have to take since he was born. What’s he’s not used to is not seeing the thing that takes him out.

It hits him hard, much harder than the kid hit him. He’s come to terms with a body made of plastic and a head full of machine-born dreams. He might not like it, but it’s who he is now. It means he has a chance of competing, and even if the playing field isn’t level, neither is it like a little league player facing off against the Yankees – not any more. 

But there’s no point to the sacrifices he’s made if some snot-nosed kid can take him out without Clint seeing him coming. 

He needs to deal with it – needs time to process it – but what with the med room, and the fragile edge to Natasha’s voice when she tries to convince the doctors, the med team, him, _herself_ that he keeps the team together, he doesn’t have time to visit his home before the team gets together to celebrate their victory over Hydra with a few team drinks. 

And then it turns out that Tony and Bruce have created a murder-bot, and events snowball from there, until Clint is faced with a team that has been pushed to its limit and is about to break. 

They need time, or they’re not going to make it, and even though he’s used to this, used to creating strategy from nothing while the world crashes down, for a moment he isn’t sure what they can do. Then he glances at Natasha, at the tense lines of her mouth and jaw, and he _knows_ what he needs to do.

—

As soon as the jet lands, Natasha knows what’s happened. 

She has no idea how Clint has got hold of a PASIV, and even less idea how he’s got them all under with him, but it is undeniable that he has, and they are now walking into his dream. 

Even if she didn’t recognize the farm, she would know. It’s something about the quality of light, about the way time feels sticky and heavy. 

She wonders if the others will guess, but despite Tony’s obvious and hilarious disbelief, they don’t. It’s possible they don’t know about the technology – probable that they would never suspect a team member of doing something like this to them. 

The thought catches in her throat, and for a second she’s scared that she’s going to choke on it. The team might not believe that one of their own could turn their subconscious on them – but it’s all too apparent that Clint knows that this is exactly what Natasha has done. 

The worst thing, though – worse than the man she loves like the brother she never had knowing the depths that she would sink to to get her own way – is that Clint has obviously been spending time down here, significant amounts of time if the adaptions and extensions to the house are anything to go by. It explains his absences after fights, at least, but the implications are horrific, and it’s all she can do to hold her tongue. 

Clint catches her eyes as she walks through the front door, and raises an eyebrow, clearly daring her to say something. She doesn’t. Even through the horror that threatens to choke her, she’s impressed. It’s an elegant solution. They need time to process what’s happened, and with Ultron ascendent in the real world, this is maybe the only way they can regroup themselves to face him.

So, she squares her shoulders, and meets his eyes as best she can. It seems to be enough, and a small smile curls the corners of his lips before he turns and greets his wife, his Laura. 

Natasha’s first reaction is shock.

It doesn’t even occur to her that this is Bobbi. She may have done an excellent job of forging a cookie-cutter perfect wife for Clint during the inception, but this is clearly a projection – one that is more well developed and aware than any Natasha has seen before, but a projection nonetheless. 

It’s quickly replaced by horror, though, when she sees that Laura is pregnant. 

_What have I done?_ she thinks and can barely swallow her horror as she hugs Laura and reaches out to touch her bump. 

“How’s little Natasha?” she asks, because she _knows_ Clint, knows that this is what he would do, both to even the score and because above everything else, she _is_ his family. 

“Actually, it’s Nathaniel,” Laura says, but the words are friendly, and Natasha’s stomach drops sickly as she realizes that this is the embodiment of the things Clint loves – and it has forgiven and accepted her unconditionally. 

“Traitor,” she murmurs to the baby, because it _is_ – it must be if it is her. 

It’s with perfect dream logic that she finds herself sharing a room with Bruce, and as with any dream she lets herself be swept along by events, doesn’t fight the flow. 

_Is this what Clint thinks?_ she wonders as she looks at Bruce. She has nothing against him – she values him as a team mate and a friend – but the idea that they might be romantically involved baffles her. 

There are many things – especially here and now – that Natasha dislikes about herself, but she has never, ever considered herself a coward. If anything, her weakness lies in her pride, her pride in her courage, her pride in never running from the things that scare her.

The Hulk scared her. 

She firmly believes she came closer to death on the Helicarrier than she had ever been before, so it was perhaps inevitable that she would seek out the thing that caused her fear, try to understand it – to master it. 

That she found herself feeling empathy with the Hulk didn’t surprise her; that she likes him did. 

It is easy to dismiss him as an animal, as a monster. But so too is it easy to dismiss her actions as monstrous. She has killed men, women, and children in numbers great enough that they cause the most hardened spymasters to blanch. She has killed strangers, enemies, and friends alike. Until Clint offered her an escape, she _was_ the dark side, the Hulk to the USSR’s pretense of Banner. 

Since then, and especially since Loki looked into her eyes and threw her soul in her face, she is trying to be careful in her judgments, so as the team came together and she started fighting next to Bruce, she did her best to keep an open mind about his other half. 

The first time he saved her, sheltering her body with his own, fear held her static. She was close enough to him that his breath washed over her, that her hair tickled his face. And there, with the fight raging around them, she looked into his eyes for the first time since he first appeared on the Helicarrier, and in them, instead of the mindless brute that Bruce referred to sometimes, she saw humor, and understanding, and some other emotion that she didn’t have time to name before the moment was over and they moved on to fight and defeat the villain of the day together. 

Afterwards, when Bruce was back to himself, wrapped in a blanket and shaking, she went and thanked him. 

“There’s nothing to thank me for,” he said, his eyes blank and his lip curled in distaste. “He doesn’t reason – he has the instincts of an animal. He could have crushed you as easily as he saved you.”

She wondered at the time, and she wonders still if the Hulk can hear him, can feel his judgment, when he says things like this. If they fuel the Hulk’s hatred for Banner. 

She’s not sure, but she’s started to think she understands him a little. Bruce thinks he has a monster inside him, but she knows that she is the monster behind her face. So she watches Bruce belittle the Hulk, beat him down over and over again. It has done little to endear Bruce to her. 

Maybe Clint sees something different, though. He must do, if this is what his subconscious is telling him. Maybe he’s trying to understand her dynamic with the Hulk. After all, someone had to be able to calm him and it seems to have fallen to her. 

Truth be told, she relishes the role. It’s an expression of trust that, for once in her life, is close to being pure. But theirs is a doomed relationship – be it love or friendship. She will never get the chance to know. Having her around literally erases the Hulk. Maybe this is why she seeks out Bruce, tries to engage with him. Maybe she is trying to understand his twin. 

Maybe it is just that she is terribly good at her job. 

But Clint can’t see into her heart, and this is something she hasn’t chosen to share, and it is touching that despite all he knows of her, that this is something Clint believes she should have. He’s happy with Laura, and he wants the same happiness for her, and that alone is enough to make her reach out and use the space the dream offers to prove to Bruce that they too have things in common. 

If nothing else it will help cement her relationship with the Hulk. 

Back in the moments before Ultron arrived, she’d told Bruce that there was a guy in her life, someone not like anyone she’d ever met, who didn’t want to be a fighter. Even now she’s not sure who she was talking about. It’s true for both Bruce and the Hulk. Ultimately neither of them want to have to fight; ultimately they both just want to be free to have a life. 

Natasha knows what that feels like all too well. 

—

All Clint intends is to give his team a moment of respite so they can regroup and work out what to do next. He really isn’t expecting the joy he takes in bringing them to his home, introducing them to his family. 

He’s delighted by Tony’s incomprehension, his insistence that Laura must be an agent, that his children must be tinier agents. It’s deeply fond and grounding, and Clint never thought he would have this chance to introduce his families to each other. 

“This is Laura,” he tells them, and takes a breath ready to introduce his team but she turns to them and smiles. 

“I know all your names,” she says, and Clint realizes for the first time that she is part of his mind, not a separate person. She’s _him_. He’s overcome by a rush of love and puts his arm around her, pulling her close, willing her to understand that he loves her, is proud of her and what she has done. 

Because it’s a risk, bringing the team here. He’d known that when he decided to do this – that he was opening his dream and his family to their eyes. Now he understands that he has opened the deepest levels of his mind and heart to them as well, and he understands, finally, that this wouldn’t have made a difference to the choices he’s made. 

He is concerned that Tony might twig what is happening. Rumors about the break up of Fisher Morrow were rife back when it happened, and he’s perfectly well aware that Eames runs a lucrative business militarizing the minds of corporate millionaires. It’s possible that Tony is militarized – it’s certain he has heard of dreamsharing. 

If he has guessed, though, Tony doesn’t seem bothered. He’s engaging in his favorite pastime – an intricate dance with Steve that is part point scoring, part courtship ritual. Today’s exciting installment involves chopping wood, and it’s all Clint can do to stop himself laughing. Freud would have a field day with this whole situation. 

He is surprised when Laura goes out to them, and starts talking to Tony. He’s not close to hear what she says, but when Tony heads to the barn, he follows. 

That Tony talks to his tractor is not a surprise. That Nick Fury is waiting for him is somewhat more shocking. Clint is fairly confident that Fury has not plugged into the dream – it doesn't feel intrusive. He’s equally sure that Fury isn’t one of his projections. He’s not seen him down here before, and he hasn’t been on Clint’s mind recently either.

Which means that Fury has to be Tony’s projection. 

It confirms what Clint suspected about Tony’s familiarity with dreamsharing, but he still doesn’t step in. He trusts Tony, and if Tony needs this chance to deal with things, then Clint is not going to stand in his way. 

And Nick tells Tony every single thing that Clint knows Tony wants to hear.

As an example of dreamshare as therapy, it is masterful and Clint, finally, walks away, because Tony is his brother too, and deserves healing. 

He goes back to his house, finds Laura, and holds his wife as close as he can. 

“I see you with the Avengers,” she says, “and, well…”

“You don’t think they need me?” It’s confirmation of everything he’s thought and feared, and it feels only right that it’s confirmed by her. 

“Actually,” she says, her eyes bright and compassionate, “I think they do. They’re gods. And they need someone to keep them down to Earth.” 

It takes a second, but it’s a beautiful understanding, and it sinks into his body, rewriting his knowledge of himself and his world as it does so. 

He gives the team as long as he can, always aware of the clock ticking in the waking world. And they do make the most of their time. Tony’s projection of Fury is robust. It more than holds its own when whipping the team together, giving them a mission and a goal. And Clint hopes (or Laura hopes, and isn’t that the same as hoping himself?) that Natasha gets a second to herself, to decide what she wants, to decide where she is going from here.

Of all of them, Natasha is the only one who actually understands what is happening, and even though there is the smallest thread of lingering resentment at what she did, Clint finds more pleasure in her aware presence here than he could possibly have suspected. 

But it can only ever be a temporary respite. 

The rules obviously don’t apply to Thor – he leaves for his own quest and Clint isn’t sure if it’s to the waking world or to another level of the dream – but for the rest of them he has to bring them back to themselves, back to the real world. 

And he honestly didn’t have a plan for this beyond giving them all time that didn’t exist to come together. He had hoped, though, that it would leave them in a more positive frame of mind. Unfortunately, that was not wholly successful – or maybe Clint’s own fatalism has infected them through the dream. He keeps catching conversations, acknowledgments that the team isn’t going to make it out of this alive, and hearing his own beliefs echoed back to him through the mouths of the people he loves makes him feel sick to his stomach. 

For the first time he understands why Natasha and Phil did what they did, and with understanding, finally, comes forgiveness. 

He’ll change, he decides. Not because of the inception or his dream family, but because he owes it to himself and to them and to his team. 

His first step is taking the twins under his, ahem, wing. 

It helps that he manages to get his own back on Pietro, manages, in fact, to shoot the ground out from under him before he notices. 

He’s not so old that he’s past it, he thinks with a triumph that is wholly unbecoming to his role. 

It also helps that he manages to stop Wanda from controlling his mind. 

He’d vowed, after Loki, that he would die before someone controlled him again, but after Pietro got the drop on him, he would be lying if he said he wasn’t nervous about his ability to resist her powers. 

The fact that he can, that he _does_ , is a testament to his own ability to adapt, to find coping strategies when he has no in-born powers to draw on. 

And even though the twins _do_ have these powers, he feels a sense of kinship with them. They’re not so different from him and Barney, he decides, except that they missed out on the circus and found a _cause_ instead. 

So, when he hustles Wanda to safety and sees her muttering things about fault and responsibility, he doesn’t think twice. 

“Hey,” he says. “Look at me.” He waits until she does, because this bit is important. It’s something he wishes someone had told him much, much earlier on in his life. “It’s your fault – it’s everyone’s fault. Who cares?” Her eyes widen and he nods, because there’s only one thing that’s important at this point. “Are you up for this?” 

She doesn’t answer, and Clint starts to think that he’s misread this whole thing – not that he can blame her. If he’d been given the choice, way back when he was her age, he’s still not sure – even with hindsight – what he would have chosen. 

“Look,” he says. “I need to know. The city is flying. We’re fighting an army of robots. And I have a bow and arrow. _None of this makes sense_.” He pauses, shoots one of Ultron’s drones, turns back to her. “I’m going back out there because it’s my job. I can’t do my job and babysit. It doesn’t matter what you did, or what you were. If you go out there, you fight – and you fight to kill.” He looks at her then and she is so very young, his heart softens. “Stay in here,” he tells her, “and you’re good. I’ll send your brother to come find you. But if you step out that door…” he stops, meets her eye, “you are an Avenger.”

He doesn’t know what effect his words will have, isn’t even sure what effect he wants them to have, until she listens to him, and walks through the door, to fight beside him, so beautiful, so young… and so afraid. 

And even though Pietro is still an ass, and it would be so much easier to shoot him and leave him for dead, Clint finds himself reluctantly proud of the twins. Proud in a way that reminds him of his own children, of the things they could achieve if they ever had this chance at existence. 

And even though logic dictates it’s impossible, they get everyone off the rock, manage to take out most of Ultron’s clones. They might, he thinks, make it out alive and in one piece.

And then he looks up and sees the child, wide eyed and afraid. And he’s reminded of his own son, of the love he has for him. And there is no other choice he could possibly make.

—

All he sees running towards the boy is his son, is Cooper.

Playing on the farm. Fighting with his sister. Fishing with Clint, down by the creek, with the sun low and warm in the sky. 

And Cooper doesn’t exist. Not in any quantifiable way. Not for anyone except for Clint. But this boy does, and he sees his mother’s face, and the pain and despair writ large in it, and he knows how Laura would look. 

_I’m sorry_ , he thinks, and hopes they can hear him, because they are going to die, along with him, here and now, and he runs towards the boy. 

There’s time enough to free him from the rubble. Time enough to see Ultron’s jet. 

There isn’t time, of this Clint is certain, to escape. 

So he turns. S.H.I.E.L.Ds the child’s body with his own. Utters a prayer to whatever gods are listening to look after his family, to let him see them in whatever afterlife there is – or whatever time he has before he bleeds out. 

And then he’s hit, bone shaking deep and sudden. It feels like nothing he’s felt before, despite all the wounds he’s endured. It’s an impact like movement, jarring and permanent. 

He will die with his eyes open though, even though the pain has yet to hit. 

And he opens his eyes. And blinks. 

“You didn’t see that coming,” Pietro says, and slumps, his body full of holes, and Clint holds the other child in his arms, the child who is alive, like none of the others are, and watches Pietro as he falls to the floor. 

Afterwards, when he climbs onto the ship that will carry him back to ground, when he passes the child back to its mother, he’s just looking for a place to sleep. 

“Are you okay?” someone asks, and he wants to laugh, because how are there words for this? 

“It’s been a long day,” he says, and then, without the comfort of the PASIV or of home, and next to the body of a boy who could have been his friend and teammate, he sleeps. 

—

There are moments in life, Natasha knows, where you have to make a choice.

Russia or America. Obedience or freedom. Isolation or a team. Life or death.

Bruce or the Hulk. 

She didn’t regret her choice even as she kissed him, even as she pushed him.

She doesn’t regret her choice now.

It would never have worked, she knows that. The one she really has feelings for was never really there. She never had the chance to get to know him in his full potential. All she has to hold on to is the memory of his eyes, eager and aware, ready to fight next to her for as long as necessary, and a handful of half-considered dreams about what could have been. 

It was always on the cards, but it feels so final now. She would have gone with him, she thinks, if he had asked. Mostly though, she is glad he didn’t. 

Bruce might have thought his other half disqualified him for the perfect house, with the white picket fence, but Natasha knows it runs deeper than that for her. She can’t imagine trusting anyone enough to let them get as close to her as Laura is to Clint, and even if she was able to have children, she doesn’t think she would do so. She knows who she is, and there is no space in that for a child. 

It was fun though, imagining she could have that life, knowing she would never have to make that choice. And now it’s gone, and instead she has to pick up the pieces left by Ultron… and left by what she’s done to Clint. 

He’s ready for her, she knows. She’s gone back to her room to check on the cat and make sure it’s got enough chicken and pettings to keep it happy, when she gets a text from Clint announcing Nathaniel’s birth. It’s deliberately taunting, and much as she doesn’t want to face this, she knows she has to. She needs him to understand why she chose to do what she did; she needs to understand why he’s choosing to live in dreams even now he has a team to be part of. She puts the cat down on the sofa and squares her shoulders. 

She can do this. She has to. 

—

It might be the last moments he gets to spend with his family, so Clint really isn’t sure why he isn’t spending the time with them. Instead he’s watching them from the back porch; Laura with Nathaniel cradled in her arms, Cooper and Lila playing on swings. The perfect family portrait, only he gets to see it move; could, if he wanted, go over and touch them, be with them. 

He doesn’t often think of the time he spends down here as dreaming, but now, with his family so very close, it feels dangerously fragile, like a bubble that would pop if he touched it. 

Maybe it’s because he knows Natasha will be here any second. He’d texted her before he went under; hadn't bothered hiding himself away. He’d even left the PASIV primed and ready for her to join him. So when he hears the back door open behind him, he doesn’t bother turning, just tries to memorize everything he can about his family, so that he can recreate this moment in his memories when Natasha has said her bit and he has to put away the PASIV and his dreams of a family forever. 

“I still think they’re convincing for such tiny agents.” 

The voice comes as a shock, and Clint’s first thought when he turns around is that Tony must be a projection, joining the dream because Clint somehow expects him to be here. 

He isn’t though. There’s something gritty and real about Tony, something that marks him apart from the rest of the dream. 

“What?” Tony asks. “You’re not gonna offer me coffee? Gotta say, Barton, I thought we were better friends than that.”

“Tony?” Clint blinks, still confused. “What are you doing here?”

“Hmmmm?” Tony’s caffeine addiction was obviously plaguing him when he joined the dream; somehow he’s managed to find a french press and is poking suspiciously at it. “Oh, well. Your subconscious seemed quite keen on getting your tractor fixed up.” He manages to press the filter down, and grins in triumph. “And, y’know, I kinda wanted to know what you were doing playing with dreamshare tech, and dragging us down here with you without mentioning it.”

“Ah.” Clint reaches for a mug from the table next to him. It’s clean enough that he offers it to Tony. “That.”

“Yeah.” Tony takes the mug and fills it with coffee. “It’s the sort of thing I’d hope you’d mention to me.”

“I should have done.” Clint shrugs. “I just didn’t know how to say it. Or, you know, have the time.”

“I got that,” Tony says. “Which is why I went along with you. But, bro,” he looks at Clint, his expression unusually serious, “you need to talk about this.”

Clint’s worried it’s going to be difficult to explain, but in the end it’s horribly easy. Tony helps by keeping quiet – Clint isn’t sure he could cope with pity as he explains how the aftermath of Loki’s control had affected him – but then Clint suspects that Tony has his own reasons for understanding the impact the battle of New York could have. The only thing that does seem to surprise Tony is that Phil is still alive. 

“I’m gonna kill him,” Tony says, and Clint frowns because, yeah, he gets that Phil was a bit of a douche for not letting them know he was alive, but that’s just S.H.I.E.L.D. 

“Sometimes it works out like this,” he says. “We don’t know why he did it. I mean,” he shrugs, “Hydra.” 

Tony’s brows snap together and his scowl deepens. “I’m going to forget Pepper for the moment.” He jabs a finger at Clint. “He made her _cry_ , Barton.” He takes a breath, makes an obvious force of will to pull himself together. “But look what he did to _you_.” 

“What?” Clint blinks, baffled. “He didn’t do anything to me.”

“You were his friend! You worked with him for years. And he let you think he was _dead_ – that you’d played some part in his death.” 

Clint looks away, suddenly interested in the floor, cursing Tony’s insight. 

“Yeah,” Tony says, his mouth curling in a totally mirthless smile. “And he _knew_ it. Why else would he have done that inception on you?”

Clint shrugs, his lips pressed tightly together.

“Dude.” Tony reaches out and touches Clint’s arm, his calloused fingers gentle on Clint’s skin. “He could have come back at any time, told you it was okay.” He takes a step back, away from Clint, and his voice turns cold. “I could feed him to the Hulk right now.” 

“He did what he thought was right,” Clint says when he thinks he can control his voice again. “He had his reasons, and he was trying to help me.”

“And did it work?” There’s still an edge to Tony’s voice, but he sounds genuinely curious and it gives Clint the courage to answer. 

“Yeah. It did. It _does_.” 

“Why?” Tony looks around him, fixes his gaze on Laura pushing Cooper on a swing, while he shrieks with excitement. “I mean, I _get_ wanting to have family of your own, but…” he looks at Clint. “You’re an okay kinda guy, Barton. You could have this while you’re awake if you wanted it.”

Clint shrugs. “S.H.I.E.L.D,” he says, like it explains everything – and maybe it does. “Family isn’t something I grew up with, and I never had the chance to get used to the idea. _Assets_ don’t. And now…” He looks at his children, their terrible, beautiful fragility. “I’m selfish. I want a wife and kids. And I don’t want them to be cannon fodder. I don’t want their lives to be a footnote in someone else’s story. I don’t want them to be something else I have to avenge.” 

Tony’s silent for a long second and then he nods. “So you keep them safe here?” 

“Yeah.” Clint watches them and feels his heart twist with love and longing. “It helps. Being down here with them gives me a chance to regroup.” He shrugs at Tony, his expression rueful. “It’s not easy keeping up with you guys.”

“Tell me about it.” Tony pulls an amused face at Clint’s expression. “What? You don’t think I feel the same?”

“Well, no. You got the suit. I never see you picking shards of glass outta your ass every time we fight in a place with windows.” 

Tony laughs. “Yeah,” he says. “I have a cushy ride. I never get bashed around like a pistachio in its shell. I don’t stay up all night trying to make armor that’s better or faster or safer, because if I don’t then the next time I fight some hot-shot villain of the day they’ll have worked out how to exploit whatever weaknesses there are…” He raises an eyebrow at Clint. “I do what I can to keep up as well, cuz I sure as hell don’t have super strength, or super speed, or super healing, or super sight.” 

“Point.” Clint’s cheek twitches in the beginnings of a smile. “Hey, Stark? Wanna swap crappy dad stories?” 

It makes Tony laugh, and Laura, hearing the noise, looks up and waves, smiling at Tony with genuine pleasure. 

“We don’t have that long,” he says, “not even with the time distortions in a dream.” 

“How did you know it was a dream?” 

“Hmm? Oh. It was obvious when you know what to look for.” Tony fixes him with a look. “I used to know Robert Fisher before his father died, you know. And when I met him afterwards, well. He wasn’t the same.”

“And you thought it might happen to you?”

“I know Saito. Of course it would have happened to me.” Tony shrugs. “The perils of being at the top of your game. So I learned everything I could about the technology, so I would know if it happened to me.”

“You’re militarized?”

Tony smirks. “You need to ask?”

“But you went along with it. You could have torn the dream apart whenever you wanted.”

“Must be getting sentimental in my old age,” Tony says, “but I trust you, and it was a useful move to make. Besides, it gave me a chance to do some things of my own.”

“Fury?”

Tony nods. “And Steve. Gave us a chance to talk we wouldn’t have had otherwise.”

There’s something about the set of his jaw that gives Clint pause, and he wonders how things have got to the point where Tony only feels comfortable having conversations that matter in a dream; he wonders when it happened to him too. 

“You have your own PASIV?” he asks, trying to give Tony a bit of breathing space, and Tony smiles, clearly onto him. 

“Somewhere. Unless someone’s stolen it, or I used bits in something else.” He gestures around at Clint’s dream. “This isn’t really something I want.”

“I guess.” Clint tries to imagine how this must look to Tony’s eyes. “You got Pepper. You don’t need to do this in a dream.”

“Hey.” Tony looks at him, his face serious. “There’s nothing wrong with building yourself a family. Even if they’re comprised of idiots and murderbots.”

And, oh. Clint realizes with a start that Tony has built himself a family every bit as much as he has, and Clint wonders how he’d feel if Lila had tried to murder humanity, if Cooper had vanished, replaced by someone who sounded the same, but who, in every respect that mattered, wasn’t the same. 

“But Vision seems cool,” he says at last, painfully aware how inadequate the words are. 

“Yeah.” Tony’s mouth twists. “He’s great. Just…”

“He’s not JARVIS?”

“Exactly.” Tony blinks, his eyes suspiciously bright. “I’ll get used to it, I guess. It’s just a big change. J was around for a long time.”

_When no one else was_ , he doesn’t say, but Clint hears it anyway. 

“I never thought I’d get to be a dad,” he says at last. “Always thought I’d run a mile, that I’d be scared I’d turn into my old man. But then these guys turned up, and I realized that I wasn’t stuck being any one thing. I know who I am, and I get to choose what I do next.” He glances at Tony from the corner of his eye. “Seems to me like Vision learned that one early on, and he must have learned it from you.” 

Something in Tony’s posture relaxes and his smile seems a tiny bit more genuine. “I’m the last person who should teach anyone what it means to be human,” he says. “And J was always much smarter than me.” 

“Every father wants his sons to do better than he has,” Clint says, suddenly sure of this, and Tony shrugs. 

“Sometimes,” he says, and Clint knows he’s thinking about Ultron. 

“So,” Clint says at last. “Where do we go from here?”

“Hmmm?” Tony blinks, as if he’s waking up from a dream of his own. “Well, I’m taking a break. Gonna let Iron Patriot do his bit for a change.” It makes Clint sad, even though he knew the team was going to change now Bruce has gone, now they have new Avengers to bring into the team, and Tony seems to see this because he punches Clint gently in the shoulder. 

“I’ll still be around,” he says. “You don’t get rid of me that easily, Barton. And you still have this.”

“You’re not gonna tell me to stop?” Clint asks, vaguely surprised, and Tony shakes his head. 

“I’d be a hypocrite if I did,” he says. “I’m not gonna get rid of my family, and I don’t care what anyone else has to say about it.”

He hugs Clint before he leaves, a proper, bone crushing hug that reminds Clint that not all his family is the product of a dream – not any more – and that he has more things to live for than he ever realized. 

Then he clears up, washes Tony’s mug and swills out the coffee pot, ready for the next brew. 

Only then does he turn around and look further into the house. 

“Are you going to come out?” he asks Natasha, “or are you gonna hide there all day?”

—

It takes a lot of faith to continue with her plan when she gets to Clint’s room and finds Tony there, plugged into the PASIV and sharing Clint’s dream. She’s not sure if he’s invited. She suspects not. But Tony, of all the team, was the most likely to have recognized what was happening when he met Clint’s family, so maybe his presence shouldn’t be the surprise it is. 

Still, she doesn’t announce herself when she joins them. Instead she lingers in the shadows of the house, while they sit on the porch outside, watching Clint’s family. 

Knowing that Tony is waking, that he is going to find her body, stretched out and vulnerable in the waking world, is a hard thing to bear, but ultimately, he is part of her team, so she remains in the dream, lets herself be vulnerable. 

It is, after all, still better than what she has done to Clint. 

She’s not sure what she’s expecting. Anger, maybe. Incomprehension. Resentment. She’s hoping for forgiveness, but she certainly doesn’t _expect_ it. Instead, he just looks up, smiles at her, gestures at the coffee pot. 

“So,” she says, because she doesn't believe in beating around the bush, “you know what we did.”

“Yeah.” He squints against the light of the setting sun. “As soon as Barney said inception to me, it was obvious.”

“Barney.” The word is confirmation to her. He must have been in the bushes the night she first met Phil, must have overheard. She should have known better than to have had that conversation anywhere near a Barton residence – they were always too suspicious for their own good. 

“Sometimes brothers stick up for each other,” he says, clearly misinterpreting her tone, and she shrugs. 

“Sometimes friends do too.”

“And there wasn’t another way to do it?”

“Maybe.” The thought has occurred to her, after all. “But not one that I could work out then.”

Clint nods, silent. 

“You’re angry with me?” She means the words to be direct, but they come out hesitant. 

“No.” He finally looks at her properly. “God, Tash. We’re all fucked up. I know that better than you do. You did the best with what you had, that’s all.”

“And you built on it.” Her voice twists a little, but he nods regardless. 

“It worked for me. Works for me.”

“Maybe.” She looks around her at the world he’s built on the skeleton they laid down. “It doesn’t mean it’s right though.”

“Why not?” He sounds genuinely curious, and that chills her more than anything else.

“It’s not right,” she says. “You cannot live in dreams and forget to live in reality.”

His laughter is a rude shock. “Does it seem like I’m not living when I’m awake?” he asks when it stops. “Cuz I sure as hell feel like I’m living.”

“Fights.” She gestures, dismissing the word. “They’re not the same as living. Where are the people you love when you’re awake?”

“Apart from you, you mean?” He raises an eyebrow. “And Barney. And Tony. And the rest of the team?”

“That’s not like having a partner though.”

He snorts. “Fine. You show me your _partner_ and I’ll find one and we can double date at the movies.”

“My partner is gone.” The words slip out without her conscious volition, and she tightens her lips too late to catch them. 

They soften the lines on Clint’s face though. “Bruce?” he asks, his voice gentler. 

She shakes her head, not able to admit it even now. “The other guy.” 

Clint doesn’t seem to expect confirmation, which is just as well because she is damned if she will give it. “Jesus, Tasha. You fucked up there.”

“I know.” 

Clint scratches at the back of his neck. “Do you ever think we’re not cut out for families and lovers?” he asks. “Not any of us?”

She wants to say something about Pepper, or Jane, but she knows in her heart that neither of them will last – no matter how much Tony or Thor want them to – and suddenly she loses her fear of this world Clint has built. It’s no less a lie than her own hopes. In the end, it’s been more helpful – certainly less damaging.

Something of this must show on her face, because Clint puts his arm around her and pulls her in close. 

“We take what we can,” he tells her. “Wherever we find it. And I’m not gonna thank you for doing this to me rather than talking, but…” he looks around. “Well, there are worse things you could have done.” 

And the problem is that Natasha _does_ understand why he’s doing it, but it scares her. She knows from bitter experience what it means to have your mind shaped and controlled, and although she knows that what she and Phil did was warmer, softer – a suggestion rather than an order – it still hurts that Clint isn’t fighting against it, is choosing instead to reinforce the message they implanted. 

“I don’t know what to do,” she says. “Clint, I love you, but you shouldn’t be doing this to yourself.”

“Oh, Tasha.” His voice is very gentle now. “What other choice do I have? How the hell else am I meant to stay alive?” 

“Alive?” She blinks at him, baffled. “But you dream to feel loved.”

“I dream to give myself time to process,” he says, like he’s explaining to a child. “Because without this I couldn’t keep up with the rest of you.”

“The rest of us?” Her voice is small, because she has never told him, not really, about what the Red Room did to her, about the serum, the operations, the training, and her heart sinks when he nods. 

“You’re all more than human.” Phil’s voice comes as a shock, and she looks around sharply. “It can be daunting for us mere mortals.” 

Clint, though, doesn’t look surprised. He nods at Phil, like he’d just been away on a job rather than separated by death. 

“Coffee?” he asks, like it’s that simple, and Phil smiles, holding up a mug in his right hand. 

“Laura made me one when I got here,” he says, and Natasha realizes that Laura has gone now, and the children are playing alone. 

“She must like you,” Clint says, and the smile curling his lips is warm. “She never normally does that.” 

“I’m honored,” Phil says, and doesn’t sound like he’s making a joke or exaggerating. “I wasn’t sure I would be welcome.”

“You are,” Clint says, and then looks at Natasha. “You both are. Always.” 

They sit there, then, the three of them. There’s a lot to be said – about superheroes and humans and what the world needs, and the prices you pay to be a hero, and why you need to pay them. 

They’ve all of them, in their own way, paid these prices, over and over, and even though this feels like this is the end of a chapter, Natasha feels in her bones that there are more troubles to face, more prices to pay. 

They finish the coffee at last, and Natasha can feel the reality of the dream starting to fray at the edges.

“What do we do now?” she asks, and Phil just looks at her.

“Our job,” he says. “What we have always done. We keep the world as safe as we can, one decision at a time.”

“And if we can’t?” She cocks her head to the side. “If we’re too tired? If the price,” she gestures at the trembling dream world around them, “is too high?”

Phil shrugs, but it’s Clint who answers. “We don’t have a choice. We’ll do the job that’s in front of us, because that’s who we are.” He bites his lip. “Bucky needs finding. Hydra has to be defeated. There’s a new team who need us. What do our lives matter in the face of that? Besides,” he’s looking out the window where Laura is pushing the children on a swing set, and laughing loud enough they can hear her from here, but his hands are covering theirs, and she can see Phil squeezing back, feel where Clint’s callouses are rough against her fingers, “we find our family along the way.” He blinks then. “It might not be conventional, but it’s ours, and I think it’s worth dying for.” 

“Some things are.” Phil reaches across to take Natasha’s hand as well. “And we knew what we were getting into.” 

She knows that – of course she does, but still, sometimes, the price seems very high, and maybe she had hoped against experience and her knowledge of the world, that some day it might be paid off in full. 

She opens her mouth to say that, or something like it, but the shaking intensifies, and the dream pulls apart around them.

The last thing she is aware of as the world comes adrift and the seams of reality bow and flex is their hands: the strength in them, the warmth of them, how they hold something in her safe through this whirlwind. 

_It’s worth it_ she thinks. All of this. Everything. But before she can say it, she wakes up. 

**Author's Note:**

> I am so profoundly grateful to have had a chance to work with Johanirae again. There is nothing more inspiring than discussing ideas of an evening, only to wake up to find an inbox full of her sketches in the morning. Her art shapes my words and makes me see them in a new light. It is the second part of this series, and you should probably be looking at it now. 
> 
> My grateful thanks to my beta readers, geckoholic and MsPeppernose. They did amazing work for me. 
> 
> This is a work that has been bookended by real life losses and deaths, and writing it has given me something to hold onto over the past few months. I can't tell you how important that has been for me. I am nervous now of releasing it into the world, and I hope you enjoy it.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Illustrations to Hope is a Waking Dream](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5202638) by [immoral_crow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/immoral_crow/pseuds/immoral_crow), [johanirae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/johanirae/pseuds/johanirae)




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